How Did You Know I Was There?
by jdho2
Summary: Continuation of my Steph/Clint soulmate AU short by the same name found in Plum Soulmates. While helping Ranger out by planting bugs, Steph feel the surprisingly non-ominous presence of someone watching her- her Avenger soulmate. Definitely rated M for smut and poor language. Disclaimer: I still don't own anything in Janet Evanovich's world or any of the many Marvel universes.
1. Meeting

**A/N: **I've decided to break JE canon a little with this story- for the purposes of this one, Steph never married Dickie. They dated seriously, bought a house together, and he cheated, but they were never married. It will be addressed in conversation later, so I just want to bring that to your attention now. First chapter is slightly altered from the original oneshot, though not too much. Remember: fate picks a soulmate or soulmates for you, and you have their first words to you written on your body. Platonic soulmate words are written in grey, and romantic soulmate words are written in black. Asgardians work a little differently.

* * *

**Chapter 1 - Meeting**

_**Clint's POV**_

She saw me. I don't know HOW, but this woman knew I was here. I'd been in my perch for hours before she and her crew showed up, and I hadn't moved a muscle. Yet somehow, she knew. I was sure of it.

"Guys, I'm made," I whispered into my communicator, careful not to move.

"That's impossible, Clint. Bucky and Steve both checked from pretty much every vantage point. Even with their enhanced eyesight, they couldn't spot you," Natasha whispered in that way too damn calm voice of hers.

"I'm telling you, that woman _knows_ I'm here." I watched in disbelief as she tensed, rubbed the back of her neck again, and turned, slowly running her eyes over the top of the building on which I had made my perch. She turned back around equally slowly, but then she pulled out her phone. "I'm definitely made," I repeated willing the team to believe me.

We'd come to Trenton, New Jersey after following a lead that some HYDRA weapons were being moved through here. Initial intel had told us that the gunrunner, Amos Beckham, had a warrant out for his arrest after failing to appear in court. Of course, wanting to know full well what the situation was, we'd done an investigation into the situation. We'd relatively easily been able to uncover that Plum Bail Bonds had written the bond, and from there it was an easy leap to someone from Rangeman being the most likely to be brought in to hunt down Beckham.

So we'd started a run on Rangeman, its CEO Carlos "Ranger" Manoso, and any employees whose employment we could verify. And that's when things had gotten interesting. Our investigation had shown that Ranger had a _solid_ team made up of largely former special forces operatives and mercenaries who seemed to be extremely loyal to their country and each other. They may have intense, checkered pasts, but so did most of our team. And we'd been able to verify that none of them were HYDRA.

Cap and Natasha's uncovering of HYDRA's infiltration in SHIELD and, it turned out in the months that followed, Stark Industries had left some very large gaps in Stark Industries' regular security. When you added in the fact that Stark had recruited Maria Hill to begin to create a privatized global security branch of Stark Industries, well, we were in need of a lot of trustworthy, loyal teams of employees to fill in those gaps that were really more chasms. Finding this ready-made, large team that seemed to check all the boxes of qualifications we needed had caused a unanimous change in mission parameters.

Instead of busting in right away to take everyone down, we'd set up a longer term surveillance mission. We'd still make sure we didn't lose the shipment of weapons, Amos, or the buyer, but we wanted to check out what kind of moves Rangeman had. Who the woman was in relation to Ranger or Rangeman, we didn't exactly know. She definitely didn't show up on any official employment records we'd been able to find, but she seemed to have a close relationship with pretty much everyone who lived and/or worked in that building. We had been able to determine that she also worked for Plum Bail Bonds, her name was Stephanie Plum, and she was cousin to Vincent Plum, the owner of Plum Bail Bonds. It seemed she was a bounty hunter who handled the lower bonds, and that was presumably how she'd met Ranger and his men.

But this wasn't a low-bond case, which is why I didn't understand why she was here and no doubt blowing my cover with that phone call. So when she hung up her phone, looked in my direction again, then ducked around the corner of the building, I started cursing up a blue streak. Still, it seemed no one on the team believed me, and Cap insisted that I wait it out. Exactly two minutes later, I felt what had to be one of my least favorite feelings in the world- the metal of a gun barrel pressing into the back of my head.

"Don't. Move. A. Muscle," a voice behind me said confidently. I went completely still, comforted by the fact that my team had heard the man and were mobilizing to provide me backup. All I had to do in the meantime was play along, so I obeyed when the voice continued, "Okay, you're going to slowly put your hands behind your head, one at a time."

Following his directions, I allowed myself to be restrained, and when I was finally able to turn around, I felt vindicated that at least it was Ranger Manoso himself who had managed to get the drop on me. He carefully and thoroughly frisked me, and I noticed him becoming more and more wary as the number of weapons he found increased. As we walked downstairs, with me at gunpoint, I said calmly, "I'm not here to cause any problems for you; I'll cooperate."

He didn't seem at all reassured and just said, "I recognize you, but I haven't placed you yet. Generally, that's not a good thing."

With a record like his, I was sure the guy had made a lot of bad enemies, so I couldn't say I blamed him one bit for that reaction. When he guided me to an SUV and shackled me into the back, I didn't take it personally, just waited to see how everything would play out. Apparently satisfied that I was secure, I was surprised when he walked over to where Stephanie had been and brought her over to the car.

They climbed into the front seats with Ranger in the driver's seat and he said, "well, there's your man, Babe. He had himself a sniper perch, just like you said, so why don't you tell me why you think he isn't dangerous?"

She turned in her seat and leaned around it to get a good look at me, and when her blue eyes fixed on mine for the first time, I felt like someone had punched me in the gut. Unable to hold the question back any longer I asked, "How did you know I was there? ESP? Telepathy? What are you, Wonder Woman or something?"

Ranger went absolutely still in the front seat and tensed up when he heard what I said while the woman let out a delighted laugh and jumped out of the car and into the backseat, causing Ranger to start cursing and telling her to stay back. I was completely baffled by her reaction until she said, laughing the whole time, "no, as much as I wish I could be Wonder Woman, I'm just a regular person, but I know what and who you are!"

I felt my eyes widen against my will, but relaxed when she pulled out her keys and started undoing my restraints, directing her comments to the man in the front seat as she chastised, "Ranger, how could you not recognize him? This is Hawkeye; you just captured an Avenger. That can't be good. Also, he's my soulmate, so I kindly request that you not restrain him again… unless I specifically ask you to, but I think I'd probably be more likely to want to do that myself…"

I was relatively sure she hadn't meant to say that last part out loud, so for now I didn't comment on it, though Ranger's amused gaze met mine in the rearview mirror so I was pretty sure he'd be teasing her about it later. She had my shackles undone and maneuvered so that her side was facing me and leaned forward a little. When she pulled up her shirt, I could see my handwriting spelling out my first words to her in black ink along the small of her back, and couldn't help but feel more than a little unworthy. I ran a finger over them, noting the smattering of grey words on her torso, front, and back, in numerous different handwritings with interest. I was pretty sure I recognized some of those, and the "Sooooo, Connie says I'm supposed to make you into a badass fugitive apprehension agent" also in grey on her arm had me putting two and two together looking at Ranger again in question. He was her mentor.

He simply nodded in a way that seemed to both answer my question and promise me a most violent death if I didn't treat Stephanie right. As far as I was concerned, that just meant he was good people so I returned the nod to show my understanding. Unwilling to start out with my newfound soulmate with a lie, I said, "we've been doing surveillance on your team as part of an operation involving Amos Beckham, so I know who you both are as well. Stephanie, please, you gotta answer my question though. If you're just a regular person, how'd you know I was there? Because I had two super soldiers check over that hiding spot, and they couldn't see me even with their enhanced vision."

She just shrugged, as she continued to stare at me like _she_ couldn't believe _her_ luck. "A few ways. The first was the tingle. I've always felt one on the back of my neck when Ranger, who is my platonic soulmate by the way, was nearby. I felt the same thing with you but like ten times stronger. And it had more, I don't know how to describe it other than to say fire, behind it. I guess actually, that was pretty much it. Beyond that it was just a gut feeling that I like to jokingly call my 'spidey-sense'. I just knew someone was up there, but I didn't feel uneasy the way I do when it's a stalker or someone trying to kill me."

Ranger spoke up then, "we'd done a reconnaissance of the area ourselves before sending Steph in, so we didn't want to believe it, but we've all learned to trust Steph's gut first, question second."

"I'm setting aside the comment about stalkers and people trying to kill you for now because I'm assuming there isn't an active threat at the moment," I paused waiting for confirmation from both before saying, "why are you here? And why were you going in alone? Unarmed? I know you don't have the background Ranger and the men we've been able to verify as his employees do."

I felt inexplicably drawn to Steph, which was probably the soulmate bond trying to form, so I was relieved when she apparently gave up trying to fight it and just crawled into my lap, sighing with contentment when the mark on her back and the one she hadn't seen yet on my abdomen lined up and made contact through our shirts. She tucked her head against my chest and under my chin, so I wrapped my arms around her before she answered, "I'm not unarmed. I'm wired and I have a taser. Ranger and his men were there for backup. I was just trying to plant some bugs so we could figure out when the best time would be for the capture. And see what else was in play because we were concerned that he was mixed up in something bigger. Given your presence, I think we can safely assume there's a big old check mark in that column."

I could hear the sound of motorcycles approaching quickly so I said, "you'd be right about that. And since Ranger so kindly smashed my earpiece, I can only assume that's my extraction incoming. Call off your men, Ranger and everything will be fine."

He did as I asked just as Cap and Natasha pulled up on either side of the SUV, with Natasha actually on the sidewalk. Ranger just lowered the back windows so that they could see in, and I smiled out at my teammates. Steph turned her head so she was facing Cap, who was obviously recognizable, but she just stayed in her position and said, "That is one sweet ride; I've got to admit, I'm jealous."

Clearly baffled by the one-two punch of the position he had found us in and the words Steph had spoken to him, he just said, "Thank you, ma'am. I certainly enjoy it."

"Ah," she replied. "So you're the polite one."

From her other side, Natasha spoke up, "Care to tell me who you are and exactly what you're doing to my best friend and the world's best sniper? I've never seen him distracted like that."

Steph shifted to look over at Natasha and she froze. "If I'd known you were the possessive one, I would have been scared out of my mind my whole life."

Natasha's serious expression turned highly amused as she asked, "so how did a 'regular person' blow your cover, Barton?" quoting Steph's words that were written in black across my abdomen to me. Goodness knows she'd seen them enough times, even carefully applied stitches around and through them, before.

Steph quickly explained the same way she had to me. Once she was done, I couldn't stop myself from blurting out, "so, how many more soulmates do you have?" I felt her face heat up in a blush against me and mentally cursed myself because that was actually a very rude question, even for a soulmate, to ask when I'd just met her. Natasha just reached through the window and smacked me, which I murmured my thanks to her for.

"Well," Steph said, shrugging off my insistence that she didn't have to answer, "you're my only romantic bond, so you can relax about that. Then there's these three here as platonics and if I'm counting right, four more platonics who I've yet to meet?"

Thinking it through, there was Bruce, Tony, Sam, Bucky, and Thor. The first four all had at least one set of grey words that they'd mentioned and hadn't met the owner of yet, but Thor had explained to us how soulmates, platonic and romantic worked on Asgard, so she wouldn't have words for him if they were paired anyway. I said to Cap, "what do you wanna bet it's actually five?"

"I'll take that bet," Natasha said a little too eagerly, "because I think it's six."

I had no idea who she thought the last one was, but I nodded my head in acceptance of the bet. I couldn't wait to introduce Steph to everyone and see if we were guessing correctly.


	2. More Soulmates and Some Excitement

**Chapter 2 - More Soulmates and Some Excitement**

_**Ranger's POV**_

Steph and Barton were sitting in my backseat happily, thankfully not getting out of hand in our presence. They just seemed content to have found each other for the moment. As much as I didn't want to, I was going to have to interrupt their bliss.

"Babe, I don't want to do this to you. I of all people know the value of spending time with your soulmate while you can, but I still need you to go in there. And we really need to move before draw any more attention."

Steph let out a huge sigh like I'd asked her to bring me the entire world on a platter with no notice and pouted. "I know, I know. But I mean, good friends leave new soulmates to…" she trailed off and I barked out a laugh at the pained look I caught in my side-view mirror on the Captain's face at the implication.

"Oh come on, Steve, it isn't like you and I didn't find a way to get acquainted very shortly after we met. Like within the hour," the Black Widow said from across the car.

"Tasha!" Barton said sounding way more scandalized than I would have expected given the grip he had on Steph at the moment. "Seriously? I was brainwashed by an alien and we were facing possibly the end of the world."

Well, that explained the tone.

"Yeah, and I'm glad I didn't run the risk of never getting a piece of that. Oh, don't give me that look, you may be straight, but you have seen Cap, right. Plus, as my platonic, you have to be happy for me. You'll understand soon enough, I dare say."

I was quickly losing control of the situation, and when Steph whined I just barked out, "No! All you have to do is plant the bugs then you can go do whatever you want for the rest of the day. As long as I don't have to witness it and you never tell me about it. Hell, I will check in with Connie to make sure Vinnie isn't going to lose any money on any of your skips while you're off the grid."

"That's alright, Steph, you can tell me whatever you want," Natasha purred.

With a giggle, Steph crawled off Barton and out the door that Steve held open for her. When she rounded the corner of the SUV, I saw Natasha swing off her motorcycle, press something into Steph's hands, and exchange whispered words with her. Steph nodded before striding off toward the building.

"I've got radios for all three of you down the block if you'll follow me," I said loudly, and Barton just buckled his seat belt, eyes fixed on the door. As I drove down the block, flanked by the two motorcycles, my eyes met Barton's in the mirror. "What'd she give Steph?"

"I really don't want to know or even think about it," when I just continued to meet his gaze periodically he sighed, "look, Manoso, can I call you that?"

"Manoso and Ranger are both fine."

"Natasha is deadly as fuck. I mean, we all are, but Natasha in particular scares the crap out of me. She'd never give Steph something that wasn't relatively safe though, and I'm sure whatever it is she thinks will get Steph out of there safely and in a hurry if she needs it to. So while I don't really even want to contemplate anything going wrong and Steph needing to use it, I trust that Natasha knows what she's doing. And I'll tell you right now, I'd recommend you adopt that strategy."

I took that in and nodded as I pulled into the garage signaling the men to stand down when the motorcycles followed. Once Barton, the Captain, and Romanoff had exchanged words, they stepped forward and I introduced them to each member of my team. Before we could move past basic small talk, Hector who had stayed off to the side started yelling in Spanish and racing toward one of the SUVs. In that moment, I saw Barton go deathly pale as something that sounded like a small explosion boomed across the radio.

I jumped into the drivers side of the SUV I'd just gotten out of, and Barton caught the bow and quiver of arrows Romanoff tossed him before he jumped onto the foot rail on the outside of the SUV. I had my window rolled down and the radio turned up so he could hear it as we approached. I wasn't expecting, as we drew closer to the building, for him to pull himself onto the roof. Before I managed to stop he'd shot an arrow that must have had some kind of retractable grappling hook at the end of it attached the bow through an upstairs window and was flying, CAT boots first, through the glass. I was pretty sure he'd already had the next arrow in his hand before he was out of my view.

Captain America had his shield affixed to the front of his motorcycle and took it off to throw through the floor-to-ceiling first floor window just seconds before Black Widow went flying through it on her bike. He followed close behind and before my men and I had even made it out of our SUV's we could hear Barton say "oh, thank God," in Steph's comm as a jet appeared out of nowhere and landed on the roof of the building. As we made it inside, I was surprised to see about a dozen men unconscious on the ground being secured by a bunch of Avengers while Iron Man inspected crates in the open warehouse. On the other hand I was not surprised to see Steph absolutely wrapped around Barton who did not appear to want to let go of her anytime soon. And I'd see to it that he didn't have to.

Looking around, Tank whistled before saying, "you all are fast."

Natasha looked up and said, "it wasn't us; it was Steph."

Steph let out a snort and her face was still pressed so tightly into Barton's chest that I barely heard her say, "yeah, thanks to you and that nifty little device."

I simply raised a brow at Natasha who shrugged and said, "combo flash-bang with high dose, quick-dissipating knockout gas. As long as you hold your breath for ten seconds, you don't get dosed."

Iron Man whipped around, "you gave her one of my prototypes? We don't even know this woman!" He strode toward Steph who was still clinging and called out, "you, Barnacle Woman, tell me everything about how it worked."

Finally Steph picked her head up and twisted around to look Tony Stark in the face, "I always thought I'd be more pissed to be called that, but I really don't care."

Stark just nodded his head and took that in stride, "okay, fair enough. You can have as many prototypes as you want. Now, details."

"It was easy and clearly effective. I pointed the arrow away from me like Natasha said to, dropped it an arms length away, it was small so they didn't think anything of it until it was too late. I closed my eyes, covered my ears, and took a deep breath as instructed. Although she said I only had to hold my breath for 10 seconds, I held it as long as I could just in case. When I opened my eyes, they were like this without the restraints. I was looking for something to tie them up until backup could get here, but they got here faster than I would have expected."

"Did you have to say 'just in case,' Doll. This would have been much shorter if you hadn't," said the man I didn't recognize with the metal arm. He kept staring at Steph expectantly, ignoring the rant Stark started on about how his tech always worked and why would anyone ever doubt it.

The man broke into a smile that made him look way less intimidating when Steph responded, "yeah, okay, so you know what you're talking about. I'll expect a heads' up from you before I step on anymore landmines. Is he ever going to stop."

"It's what he does," the man who had some sort of jet pack on his back said. "You learn to just block it out when you don't need the information. He'll wind down eventually."

"Another good judge of character. This'll be helpful."

We went through another round of introductions. Taking in everyone in the room, I laughed and said to Steph, "That's a lot of soulmates at once, Steph."

"I think they're going to be a handful," she grumbled.

Captain Rogers flat out laughed, and when Steph asked what was so funny, it was Sam who pantomimed picking up a phone as he said with a chuckle, "Hello, Kettle? This is the Steph. You're black!"

"You couldn't possibly know that," Steph argued. "This could just be a fluke."

Now it was my men and my turn to laugh.

"Nice try, Babe."

Speaking for the first time since we'd entered the warehouse, Barton said, "I seem to remember you yourself saying something about stalkers and people trying to kill you, Steph. And not in the way that made me think it was just one or two."

"Wait, who else is your soulmate, Steph?" Tony asked distractedly and at least a couple minutes behind in the conversation.

"All my platonic soulmates, please raise your hands," she said. When we did, she nuzzled back into Barton and said, "and this one is _mine_ mine."

"Huh," Tony responded. "Any chance you got one more set of words in grey."

"Yep! One more platonic still hiding out somewhere."

"I think I know where. And I'll bet a thousand bucks it's actually two platonics you haven't met yet."

"Ten grand says three," Natasha added lazily.

Tony snorted out a laugh, "I'll take that bet. We only know one Asgardian and he doesn't tend to bring friends around."

It had taken a while because the neighborhood we were in wasn't really one that cops bothered with, but I finally heard sirens in the distance. Holding my keys out to Steph I said, "go, we've got this. You can talk to the cops later if they need you for some reason."

The Captain was already shaking his head, "that won't be necessary, we'll be taking jurisdiction here, so we'll be the ones talking to you when you're both ready. Maybe tomorrow?"

Neither Steph nor Clint made a move yet to take the keys. In fact, Clint dragged her over to a corner, had Steph turn off her wire, and they held what appeared to be a friendly but urgent conversation for several minutes. We all tried to give them as much privacy as was possible in the large open room, but when they ended their conversation by starting to make out, I cleared my throat loudly. They seemed undeterred until Natasha picked up a wrench from a nearby workbench and threw it at Clint's head. With a laugh, he caught it effortlessly and guided Steph back over to the group.

I held out the keys again and Barton just waved them off. Then he gestured to the team and said, "they might need them though. Steph and I are taking the jet."

No one visibly reacted to that statement until Captain Rogers cleared his throat, "we still need to get the buyers."

"We'll be back within 24 hours."

"Where will you be if we need you?" Natasha called after them as they started to leave.

"Don't!" Clint shot back.

I held the keys out to Natasha, "you guys need wheels."

Tony Stark stepped forward, "thanks, but by the time we're done here, a car will be here as well as another jet nearby until we're ready to go back to New York for the night."

Captain Rogers turned to me and said, "now, I know you and your team have your man there, but we'd like to ask him some questions before you take him in, if that's alright. Then you can let us know if you'd like to help us take out his buyers or not. No pressure either way."


	3. A Quick Trip

**Chapter 3 - A Quick Trip**

**Steph's POV**

When Ranger held the keys to one of the SUVs out to me, I hesitated for a moment, wanting to ask Clint what he wanted to do and where he wanted to go. He must have had a similar reaction because he pulled me to the side and asked me to turn off the wire so he could talk to me privately. Of course, private was relative in a room full of people, but we could only do our best.

"How many romantic soulmates do you know who didn't work out?"

I thought about what he was asking hard for a few seconds before I said, "personally, maybe one set?"

"Out of how many?"

"Lots an lots. Dozens if not over a hundred over the years, and I don't hear about them splitting up the way you do non-matched couples."

"Pretty good odds, right? As long as we work together on any issues we come across, I'm sure we'll make it. And how many do you know who died or had their soulmate die before they met or really got a chance to be together."

I thought of Ranger, who met his romantic soulmate before I met him, as he was shipping out for a mission, only to have her die in a car accident while he was overseas. Though I'd never asked, I was certain several other of his employees had similar stories. "Too many, and it's so sad." I replied sparing a quick glance toward Ranger.

"It really is. Steph, when I heard that explosion over the radio, I thought I was going to lose you so soon after I found you. I've seen the hollow shell people become, and I don't want to be that. I don't want you to be that, but even if it does end up happening some day, because neither of us have particularly safe jobs, I want to know that we didn't hold anything back."

"I've had some close calls over the last few years, and I'd started to believe that I was never going to find you. Thank goodness Ranger talked me out of trying to force a romantic bond with him because that would have destroyed the friendship he and I have, and I wouldn't have you now, Clint. And I want this more than anything I can remember wanting- even when I was a kid and wanted to fly. I know we'll make it work because I want it so badly. I'll do anything to keep you in my life."

Clint brought his hands up to cup my face, and I saw the same desperation I was feeling in his face. What's more is I was already beginning to feel it through our bond, something only the strongest pairs could accomplish. For many it took years to reach that level of attachment, so for us to feel it already meant that our bond was a very strong one.

"Steph, I want to do something crazy, and if it's too crazy for you, that's fine. There's no pressure here, I'll take our relationship at whatever pace you want."

I licked my lips and nodded, "fast is good. And I've done a lot of crazy things in my life, so let's hear it. Probably it won't even be the craziest."

"Let's take the jet, and fly to Vegas right now. Take the gamble and just get hitched. I want to know that we're together in really every way possible."

"I'm probably not going to be a good wife, Clint. I hate cooking and cleaning, my job is dangerous and I'm not particularly great at it, and I really don't like being told what to do. I don't want kids now, and I don't know if I ever will."

"Well, I can't see as I blame you for not liking cooking and cleaning. I certainly don't enjoy either, and I wouldn't expect you to do something for us I wasn't willing to do myself. I'm perfectly content living on take-out and date nights," he smiled so sweetly at that, I couldn't keep myself from returning it with a smile of my own. "I'm not even sure I want kids either. I mean, if 'oops' or something, that's fine, but for now I'm good with not planning to have any. And if either of us changes our mind, we'll talk about it. I'm pretty sure I'll be fine either way on that one; you can steer that ship, Steph.

"As for your job… First of all, my job is dangerous too, so I don't have a problem there. That would be hypocritical. Beyond that, though, I'm not going to tell you what job you can and can't have. If you want to keep doing the bounty hunter thing because you like it and find it fulfilling, that's fine. I mean, I'm going to ask you to let me and the others train you on it a bit more, but that's fine. If you're only doing it because you feel like that's all that is available to you, I want to help you find other options. There are things that you will have learned from your time in that kind of job that I have no doubt will be useful to the team. Or you don't have to work if you don't want to, but know that I will have to go away on surveillance and missions occasionally. Sometimes for long stretches of time, and it would probably be best if you found something to do to help occupy that time. I'm happy to fill it in whenever I'm home, but when I'm not..."

"I feel like you're just too good to be true," I said because really he'd just managed to eliminate basically every concern I'd ever had about marriage.

"I'm not," he looked at me plaintively, and I could feel him willing me to understand, "I've done some things, Steph. Some bad things. Before I joined SHIELD, I had some very dark times. And then apparently even when I joined SHIELD, it may not have always really been SHIELD I was doing things for, so even if I thought they were for the right reasons... I'm not a good person."

"Shhh," I whispered. "It's okay. I can only guess what you've done in the past, but I know what you do now. You've helped save the world, and you and your teammates are still trying to make it a better place. I'm pretty sure your good karma outweighs the bad."

"I'm not sure it does yet, but I'm working on it."

Whatever he seemed to think, I knew this was a good man, so I met his gaze and whispered, "okay."

Clint went completely still. So still, in fact, that I instantly understood him being a successful, deadly sniper. "Okay, as in okay I understand that you're working on being a better man?"

"No," I said, "Okay as in, let's ditch these guys and go get hitched."

"Really?" There was so much hope on his face, I could feel it all the way through to my toes.

"Really. We'll work out the details as we go; after all, we were meant for each other."

Before I could say anything else, Clint had wrapped himself around me and we were locked in a kiss I'd been waiting my whole life for. When he pulled back for a moment so we could catch our breaths, I panted out, "why have we not been doing this for the past hour since we met?"

Instead of answering, I felt him pull me back into him again and instantly melted into him. My hands were wandering on his lower back, trying to find a way under his shirt to get skin contact when I felt him spin me away from the others a little, putting himself between me and something his free hand reached up and caught. The low, dry chuckle he let out was enough to make me think my panties were going to self-combust. Thankfully they didn't, and within a couple more minutes, we were out the door, climbing the fire escape to the roof where the jet was waiting.

"I really don't have the best of luck with fire escapes."

"Meaning?"

"They collapse with me on them. Creepy people use them to break into my apartment. You know, the usual."

Once we'd made it to the roof, Clint kept an arm around me guiding me forward while using his other to pull out his phone.

"Tash, can you secure Steph's apartment while we're gone?" He asked into his phone, giving me a wink as he buckled me into the co-pilot seat. "Any requests, Steph?"

"Uhhhh, nothing that requires a degree in computers to operate. Ask Ranger, I've gotten frustrated and shot the keypad pretty much every time he's tried one of those systems."

Clint chuckled and dropped a kiss to my forehead.

'You got that, Tash? Thanks, apparently she has an issue with un-friendlies breaking in."

"Un-friendlies, friendlies, anyone on the freaking planet who wants in," I muttered to myself, but I noticed some tension creep into Clint's body at that, so he'd heard me. I tried to give him a reassuring smile, but I didn't think it really helped.

"No, I'm not telling you where we're going. We'll see you tomorrow, okay?" He shut the phone off and threw it onto a little flat spot in front of the jet's control panels that seemed to be designed exactly for that. I watched quietly as he buckled himself in then ran through a bunch of checks before we were suddenly flying through the air at what felt like much faster than a regular plane's speed.

Once it seemed like we were safely underway, I looked down at the dizzying array of buttons, screens, dials, and every other electronic interface imaginable. Sneaking a glance over at Clint, I caught him watching me with amusement. "Just don't pass out or anything because I don't even have anything approaching a clue what any of this does. In fact, I'm kind of scared to move." It was true, I had my hands folded in my lap holding onto each other in a death grip lest I somehow spontaneously fall over and hit a button or something.

"Would you like to?"

"To what? Move? Not if it means crashing the jet."

"Know how to fly this."

"I really, really don't think that's a good idea. Cars I drive blow up for practically no reason, and I can't imagine adding flying vehicles to the list would be a good idea."

"Oh, come on, this thing has seen WAR, it's built for explosions. And you said you wanted to fly as a kid." He said with a cocky grin on his face. "First thing you gotta do is meet JARVIS. He's Stark's AI and has been added to the team's quinjets, which is what this is called. JARVIS, say 'hi'. This is Steph, and she's my romantic soulmate as well as everyone else on the team who she has met so far's platonic. She's a VIP."

"Hello, Ms. Plum. Mr. Stark has just finished entering in all your data and security clearance for my system moments ago. If you need anything, all you need to do is ask. And to the point Mr. Barton was making, I am fully capable of flying this jet. So if anything happens to Mr. Barton, you can rest assured I won't let you crash."

"Right," Clint said, rubbing his hands together like an eager little kid. "So, you can pretty much get in one of the team's jets, tell JARVIS where you want to go, and you're all set. But, just in case, let's get started."

Clint started quickly rattling of information, patiently repeating and explaining when I got confused. When he finally stopped, I looked over at him and smiled, "thanks. Though I'm pretty sure I won't remember any of that in a few minutes. By the way, I don't think you ever said… how fast does this thing go?"

"The other one goes up to Mach 8, and Stark's been improving this one so it is getting close."

"So…?"

"Few thousand miles an hour at top speed. Something like that."

"Huh." Which definitely explained why I realized that Clint was back fully focused on the flying. I watched curiously as he manually landed the jet. "This is not at all how I remember this airport looking," I mused quietly as he powered down the jet.

"I doubt you've been here before. This is Henderson Executive Airport. I'm assuming you flew here commercial whenever you've been here before, so you would have flown into McCarran on one of the major airlines. This is a Tony Stark special."

So saying, Clint helped me out of my harness and we walked out of the jet hand in hand. Clint just nodded solemnly at some attendants who quickly darted forward, and we stepped into a waiting limo.

"How…?" I asked, completely baffled.

"JARVIS is a miracle worker, and you'll get used to it eventually."

I snuggled into Clint in the back of the limo and before I knew it, we were wandering around shops in The Venetian. I watched Clint's face carefully as I wandered through dresses quickly figuring out that purple was his favorite color (I suppose given his uniform it shouldn't have been a surprise) and selecting a simple sleeveless chiffon gown in a flattering shade. It had a sweetheart neckline, a generous slit up one leg, and the cutouts that made the back open just barely wrapped around my sides to give a hint of skin in the front. Definitely not a standard wedding dress, but it had personality, and I could tell Clint liked it. Clint quickly picked out a pair of slacks and a nice shirt, and we both grabbed some clothes for the next morning.

When we made it into the jewelry store, Clint kept trying to steer me toward the engagement ring/wedding ring combos until I dug my feet in.

"I don't want some big diamond, Clint," I whispered. "I just want a nice band."

"You can have whatever you want, Steph. Money isn't a problem here."

I pressed a kiss to his lips, and said, "I know, and I appreciate it, but really what I want is…" I looked around the cases, and quickly spied what I wanted and pointed.

It was a beautiful platinum antique style ring with princess cut diamonds wrapping around the entire band. It had plenty of sparkle, but it all laid flat and was beautifully understated. When I tried it on, I did a little happy dance, so Clint just indicated that we'd take it before moving onto the men's section picking out a platinum band for himself that had a rugged look almost like it still had tooling marks on it- it seemed to fit what I'd learned of his personality so far well.

"You're going to wear a ring?" I asked quietly, both surprised and touched.

"Of course I am, Steph. Thanks to Cap and Natasha, not to mention all the PR work and action figures, my cover is thoroughly blown, so it isn't like I'm doing actual undercover work these days. I'm too recognizable, especially by anyone we'd be going after. And people are going to figure out that we're married. I don't see any reason to hide it, and I want it there to remind me of you when we're not together."

Clint left me at the spa with my dress and a new pair of shoes while he went to check us in and take the rest of the packages upstairs. JARVIS must have called in some serious favors because I made it through the spa with several women working on me in what had to be record time. When Clint picked me up, he had a couple of staff with him and a bouquet of white roses for me. Much to my delight, we were taken to a beautiful white gondola with a celebrant to perform the ceremony and photographer. Twenty minutes later we were married and I couldn't stop smiling. The photographer was kind enough to take the last two pictures with each of our phones, so we could send them off to our friends. With the messages sent, I couldn't wait to get upstairs, finally alone for some uninterrupted quality time with my new soulmate and husband.


	4. Wedding Night

**A/N:** Okay, this chapter is mostly smut. If that's not your thing, then just skip to the author's note at the bottom. You won't have missed anything important.

* * *

**Chapter 4 - Wedding Night**

_**Steph's POV**_

When we hit send on the texts with the wedding photo for our friends, we powered off our phones immediately with Clint reassuring me that JARVIS could override his and turn it back on in the case of an emergency. Then we quickly made our way to the elevator, waiting only semi-patiently for it to arrive. Of course we weren't the only ones to get on, so we had to make polite chit-chat and accept nosy congratulations from complete strangers. When the last group finally exited the elevator leaving us alone, I hiked up my skirt, took advantage of the slit, and jumped onto Clint, trusting him to catch me.

Thankfully my trust was not misplaced, as he eagerly did so and turned to push me up against the wall. The hand that wasn't supporting my weight slid through the cut-out on the side of the dress and enthusiastically up to cup my breast. As he made contact we both groaned, me at the feel of his skin on mine, and Clint at the realization that I wasn't wearing a bra. I could almost hear him mentally run through the errands that we'd run that day and the fact that he hadn't seen me pick out any underwear at all. There was that completely still sniper routine again, but this time I couldn't help feeling just a little like the deer that was caught in his crosshairs.

Before he could think too long and run the risk of us getting arrested for doing something in public that you really weren't allowed to, the moment was interrupted by the ding of the elevator doors. Clint looked over his shoulder, and apparently we were on the correct floor because I heard murmured words of thanks, then locked my legs even tighter around his waist because we were moving. Without even breaking a sweat, Clint carried me into the hotel room. Instead of setting me on my feet when we got inside though, I was surprised to have him secure the door then carry me from room to room while carefully checking windows and every nook and cranny.

Apparently finally satisfied, he carried me back into the master bedroom and gave me another heated kiss. Wanting to get the show on the road, I quickly started working through the buttons holding his shirt closed. His hands had instantly found their way inside my dress again, so I had to pull away from those in order to get him to take his shirt off. Once he did, I couldn't help but take a minute to enjoy the view. He was cut. Not that his archer arms hadn't been a good indicator, but still, it was nice to see his chest and abs back up what his arms had promised. By the time I made it to his waist where his pants started, I was feeling pretty desperate. Then I saw my words on his abdomen for the first time, I couldn't help but run my fingers across them.

Of course my hands started to wander lower, unzipping his pants and shoving them down. I managed to restrain myself from pointing out that if he could go commando then so could I because I had better things to do. Completely on their own those hands started to grab a very intimate hold, but Clint quickly snagged them and pulled them all the way back up to his shoulders.

"You can explore later. After," he said against my mouth, and I could feel the smile pressed against my lips as he did so. Taking advantage of my raised arms, he slid the zipper down my side and moved my arms one by one to get the dress off me.

When his hands started exploring in detail and he dropped down to his knees in front of me, I pulled him right back up and whispered urgently, "later. This is all I've been able to think about all day."

"You haven't known me all day," he whispered back.

I huffed out a breath of frustration, "fine, since I saw you. Before you even opened your mouth, but whatever. It has taken too long to get here; you need to get in me like now."

"Do I need something?"

"No, clean. Shot. Now." I let out a sigh of frustration when he picked me up and moved away from the bed, but was silenced by a nip on my neck. As we moved toward the bar, I remembered something I'd heard that, for those lucky enough to have soulmarks in complementary locations, soulbonds would form best and strongest when they were touching skin to skin during consummation, and figured out what he was planning. Sure enough, he sat on the barstool before pulling me to his lap facing away from him. As he slid into me, our marks slid into alignment and my body was engulfed in a pleasurable fire.

Neither of us were keen to separate any more than necessary, relying instead on swiveling hips to generate motion. There would be time for frantic heat again later, so as soon as we connected, we slowed down to really take in the experience. It was as though there was an entire quadrant of my brain occupied with Clint and my connection to him that had unlocked in that moment. I hadn't even known something was missing until I felt him there. Through the connection, I could feel his excitement and pleasure as well as a contentment and sense of rightness to match my own. Those feelings, combined with one of Clint's hands that had been on my hip reaching around to provide me with some much needed friction sent me flying over the edge. With a sense of relief, I felt Clint join me.

Clint had one arm banded around my waist holding me secure, and the other came up to run a hand through my hair when I turned my face to nuzzle it into his neck. "I vote we just never move. That's reasonable, right?" I asked.

"Well, I don't know about never, especially because we'll need to order in some dinner and eat it. The room service delivery person will probably freak out if they open the door and find us like this."

"Be a good story down the road."

"True, but if Cap ever found out, he'd use his disappointed face on us. That's always a bummer."

"Like you single handedly destroyed freedom and the American way of life?"

"That about covers it."

We sat there comfortably for several minutes just buzzing along on the soulbond high. Clint was stroking my hip, and eventually the motion started to perk up my lady parts again. I could even feel Clint clue in over the bond to my growing arousal and felt him begin to stiffen even as he groaned.

"Hey, at least we're compatible in _every_ way," I reasoned. "Also, that's an impressive recovery time there, they teach you that in spy school?"

"Very funny, Gorgeous. No, I think this is either a one-day soulbond affirming thing or a you thing, but what do you say we take this to the shower and enjoy it while it lasts. Just in case it is only a one-day thing? Plus, if we're in the shower, then we'll be on our way to being cleaned up by the time we're done."

With a little wiggle, bringing Clint even more to attention, I agreed before hopping off and starting in that direction. Not hearing him behind me, I turned around and saw him pulling a gun and a wicked looking knife out of a duffle he'd brought from the jet and bringing them with him. I simply raised an eyebrow in question, and received a simple "you can never be too careful," in return.

Honestly, with that attitude, it surprised me a little that he and Ranger weren't soulmates. Though from what I'd gleaned previously from news coverage of the Avengers and from comments Clint had made, he'd had an intense, extensive experience with life so far. So I cut him some slack and let him bring the weapons with him into the bathroom then the bedroom.

That extensive life experience obviously spread into the realm of sexual knowledge in a way that had me wanting to worship at the feet of Fate herself and promise to never question her ever again. The man was a miracle in bed, and that was with him just limiting us to positions in which our marks could remain in contact. I was pretty sure when he removed that from the equation, he'd somehow manage to be even more orgasmically creative. I might never need sugar again.

After our shower, we had paused long enough to eat before falling finally into bed together. After a couple more rounds in bed, we'd fallen pretty deeply asleep with my back spooned to Clint's front and those marks in constant contact. Feeling him behind me and through our bond just made me feel complete and comfortable in a way I never would have previously dreamed possible.

Probably that sense of rightness considering the way my life normally went should have been my first warning and kept me from jumping quite so badly when Clint's phone started ringing from where it was sitting next to the bed. Clint just made a soothing noise and ran a hand gently over me to calm me down as his other hand reached over and grabbed the phone.

"What?" Clint's body tensed up more than it had when the ringing had started, and I felt his grip around my waist tighten a little. I couldn't hear, and wasn't trying to, exactly what was being said over the phone. I was pretty sure the voice I was hearing was Natasha, and I just toned it out.

That was until I heard three voices I clearly knew protesting in the background. Ignoring Clint's own protest I grabbed his phone out of his hand. "Hey Tash. Chunky black woman in really tight spandex and… actually I'm not sure I remember right now what color her hair is this week. Another woman, big teased black hair. Looks kinda like Betty Boop? Then a totally normal woman who looks like a soccer mom because she is one and you can't figure out why she's with the other two?"

"You know them then?"

"That's Lula, Connie, and Mary Lou, please don't kill them, I like them." Clint chuckled behind me and, apparently appeased about the situation pulled me closer to him and let his hands start to wander. "And, honestly, be grateful it isn't my grandmother. Put one of them on the phone, and I'll reassure them that I'm fine."

There was the sound of some scuffling, and a couple little exclamations of pain that made me think Lula was pulling hair to get her way before I heard "Skinny Ass White Girl, you have some serious explaining to do!"

"Sure, Lula. Day after tomorrow, okay?"

"Day after tomorrow? You text Lula a picture of you with a man I ain't never seen before looking like you just got married, and you expect me to just do nothin'?! How do we know he didn't kidnap you? And who is this crazy bitch in your apartment? She's a slippery one, I didn't manage to pull any of my moves on her."

I huffed out a sigh and laid my head back on Clint's chest, not even sure where to begin explaining and trying very, very hard not to just start moaning from what his hands were doing.

"Lula, that's Natasha. Please don't try to sit on her, bite her, and for the love of all that is holy, do not try to shoot her." Clint had to bury his head in the back of my shoulder to muffle the sound of his laughter. But he didn't do a good enough job, because Lula definitely heard.

"Who the hell was that, White Girl? Are you being threatened right now? Or are you gettin' lucky?"

She had no idea how lucky I was getting and would be getting again if she would just get off the damn phone. I heard another choked sound come from Clint and realized I'd said that out loud. I clapped a hand over my mouth and looked back at him apologetically, but he was all smug smile, so I was pretty sure he didn't care. If anything, it caused him to redouble the effort he was putting into his wandering hands.

I could hear Lula telling Connie and Mary Lou that I was doing the nasty while talking to her on the phone, and I just cut in. "Look, Lula. That was Clint, he's my romantic soulmate, and yes, we got married yesterday. So you are interrupting my wedding night here."

"White Girl, it is 9 in the damn morning!"

"Huh, really?"

"Damn that man must be good for you to lose track of time like that, but I'm not surprised, you can totally see in his eyes that he must know what he's doing." I could hear Natasha busting up laughing in the background for the last several minutes, and she found a second wind at that comment.

"Lula, listen, just. Ugh, seriously don't break into my apartment again."

"We just wanted to make sure you weren't being held hostage or turned into one of them mail order brides or nothin'. Again."

"I've never been turned into a mail order bride!"

"No? Huh, I could have sworn. Must have been a dream then, but you've been kidnapped more than enough times."

"Fine, that's fair, but I haven't been kidnapped. I'm just enjoying some quality time with my husband and soulmate, and I'd like to get back to that now. So please, give the phone back to the scary redhead, who by the way, is one of my platonic soulmates, and I'll stop by the bonds office tomorrow to explain."

"You're not coming back until tomorrow?"

"No, we're coming back today, but we have things to do."

"Yeah, well you best get your skinny white ass to the office to do that explaining today or we'll just break in again tonight and every night until you do."

I started banging my head on the pillow as I said, "fine, i'll come see you today. Now, can you please give the phone back to Natasha." Hearing her comply, I propped myself up a little on my elbow again.

"Good morning, Lastochka. Are you having fun in Las Vegas?"

"Yes, we are. Look, I'm sorry if you had to get up early and fly out to my apartment to deal with intruders. They really had good intentions."

"I can tell, and I didn't have to fly out. I stayed here last night. We all did, actually."

"I'm sorry, what?"

"Clint indicated that there was a security threat, so the team wanted to handle it until we could finish getting your new security set-up. Thankfully I sent the men on various errands before the unexpected visitors arrived, otherwise it would have been a much ruder welcome your friends received. They went to get food because we couldn't find any. What do you eat, Lastochka?"

Clint had stilled behind me, apparently hearing what Natasha had said. "Look, it's no big deal. I couldn't afford to go to the grocery store this week because rent was coming due, so I was just bumming food from my parents. I do it all the time. My mom gets to lecture me, and I don't starve. Win-win. And I was more than going to make rent with the check from Ranger for the work yesterday, so I would have gone to the store on my way home yesterday if I hadn't gotten distracted."

Clint had slid out from behind me, and I watched curiously as he walked around the bed, grabbed my phone off the bedside table, powered it on, scrolled through the phone numbers programmed in, and made a call. As soon as the person on the other end picked up, he started yelling and left the room phone pressed to his ear.

I groaned and rolled onto my back, "I think Clint is yelling at Ranger now."

"Good."

"Ranger wouldn't let me starve, Natasha. He just didn't know how bad it was this time, but he gives me money whenever he does know."

Natasha made a noncommittal noise, and I rolled my eyes. "Don't roll your eyes at me, Stephanie."

"How could you even know that?"

I heard some shuffling in the background and waited patiently for Natasha to come back on the line. While I was waiting, Clint returned and slid back into the bed, rolling me onto my side again and pulling me into him.

"Steve and Bucky are back, and take my word for it, once they got over the whole inflation-adjusted pricing thing, super soldiers are great at making grocery runs. They can carry so many bags. There's plenty of food now, so we'll start cooking when Sam gets back and see you soon for brunch." She hung up without another word, so I handed Clint his phone back.

"We've been summoned for brunch. I didn't even have time to ask how they all even fit into my apartment."

"Don't worry about it," Clint murmured while surprising me by rolling me onto my belly and sitting up to give me a massage. It felt heavenly, and I couldn't hold back the groans and moans as he worked out any stubborn knots that were still remaining after a blissful night of passion. Before too long, he pulled my top half up so I could prop myself on my elbows. Then he shifted one of my legs out to the side and shifted to press into me. I let out a gasp because although he was using his arms to support a lot of his weight, the pressure of him on my pelvis made every leisurely stroke feel absolutely devine. His mouth was alternating between toying with my neck and whispering positively filthy things into my ear, so it was no surprise when just a couple minutes later I was crying out in a very powerful release. A few strokes later, Clint was doing the same.

Floating, I sank back down onto the bed, hardly noticing when Clint got up and started moving around. I'd barely dozed off again when I felt Clint grab me up and throw me over his shoulder before carrying me into the bathroom and stepping back into the shower. "I was sleeping," I mumbled out sighing when I felt Clint lower me to my feet.

He waited until he seemed confident I could stand on my own before letting go and grabbing the shampoo. He lathered my hair instead of his and said, "trust me, you don't want to ignore a summons from Natasha. It's not pretty."

"But… sleep! Surely she understands sleep."

"As a concept, sure, but she doesn't luxuriate in it the way you seem to, so I wouldn't count on that saving you from her wrath. She won't be particularly sympathetic over lost sleep."

"It's a talent, to be sure," I responded as I tipped my head back to rinse out my hair. "I've worked a lot of years to perfect it."

When we climbed back out of the shower, I noticed that Clint had set our clothes and a toothbrush each out for us already. I brushed my teeth then fingered the brand new underwear sitting on my stack of clothes.

"I don't remember buying this. In fact, I don't remember buying any underwear yesterday."

"I know, but as already discussed, you're adverse to the jet crashing. With that in mind, you not wearing any underwear felt like an unnecessary risk. Wouldn't want to start our first big fight on our first full day together."

I kept my head down and didn't meet his eyes as I hopefully asked, "does that mean we're not going to fight over the whole job and food thing either?"

Clint boosted me up on the counter and put his hands on my face, gently tilting it up until I gave in and met his eyes. "No, we're not going to fight about you doing what you had to do to get by, so long as you understand that we're married, and you don't have to worry about that anymore. Let me take care of you, okay?"

I felt more than a little challenge work into my eyes as I sniffed and said, "we take care of each other."

"Absolutely, Gorgeous," Clint replied giving me a quick kiss before hustling me to get dressed and make my way out of the suite, hand in hand with him.

As we rode in the back of the limo to the airport where the jet was waiting I said, "oh man, we didn't even get to use that awesome tub."

Clint picked up the hand he was holding in his and pressed a kiss to the back of it. "We'll come back and try it out another time, okay?"

"Okay," I answered petulantly.

"Would you cheer up if I assured you that my apartment has a much more impressive bathtub in it?"

* * *

**A/N:** Google assures me "Lastochka" is the phonetic (because I don't really feel like dealing with the Cyrillic alphabet regularly) Russian word for "Little Swallow" (the bird). I figured that with Steph married to Hawkeye, Steph will probably pick up some bird-related nicknames from the team. And with Natasha likely to feel protective of Steph, it would be a good candidate- it's something someone might call a little sister. That being said, if there's something wrong with it, let me know!


	5. Cars and Sparklers

**Chapter 5 - Cars and Sparklers**

_**Natasha's POV**_

In my head, I just kept repeating a mantra of "don't cut Tony, don't cut Tony." When Clint had asked me to secure Steph's apartment, I'd known we wouldn't be able to get everything we'd need done with what was left of the day, so I'd told the team I'd be staying. Apparently Steph brought out the protective instincts in everyone, so they'd all insisted on doing the same. A quick call back to the Tower to Bruce had let him know and allowed him to inform us that Thor was back on Earth but expected he might be called away again shortly. Trusting the two of them not to tear apart the Tower alone was much easier than other combinations, so we'd pulled Steph's address from our files for this operation and gone to her apartment.

We'd wanted to assess her current security, so I'd sent Steve and Bucky in the front door and taken the fire escape for myself. Less than a minute later, we were all inside and adamantly agreeing with Clint's request for more security. As soon as Tony had joined us, he'd taken one look around the apartment, and opened his mouth. It was then that I'd had to start repeating my mantra, and a little over twelve hours later, I wasn't sure it was going to keep me from severely maiming Tony for much longer.

"I just don't get it," Tony said for what seemed like the five _millionth_ time. "People actually live like this? How do people live like this? My dorm in college wasn't even this bad."

"It's not that bad," Steve and Bucky said in unison for also the five millionth time, reminding us all that they'd grown up during the Great Depression. Of course, the fact that it wasn't an outrageous comparison to make given the state of her cabinets and fridge was beyond just bare, with the exception of hamster food, was kind of a point in Tony's favor.

"Well, Tony," I started, pausing only for a split second when I heard Clint and Steph walk in. "I imagine it started when her parents weren't multi-millionaires. And I'd imagine it continued when she needed a car for work and didn't get the cheapest rent she could find in Trenton because she didn't particularly want to worry about getting shot or raped every night."

From the entryway, Steph added, "also, the part where I used up almost every penny of my savings to buy a house together with a boyfriend who was a lawyer so I let him do all the paperwork. Of course, then he cheated on me and kept the house with no kind of repayment when we broke up.

"And that was just before I got laid off because the company I worked for got shut down by the FBI for all kinds of money laundering and embezzlement charges. Let me tell you, having a business degree without distinction in the first place, and a single entry in your work history that is riddled with those kind of FBI issues... Well, let's just say that's the kind of resume that ensures nobody wants to hire you to actually use said degree anymore. Or to do much of anything, really." She took a deep breath then said, "hence the blackmailing my cousin into letting me be a bounty hunter thing. Plus, it's kinda fun when I'm not getting shot at, threatened, kidnapped, or covered in trash."

There was silence in the apartment at that, and everyone kind of looked at Steph with varying degrees of pity. She walked over to where there was some fruit set out and grabbed a couple of grapes, popping one in her mouth then dropping the other in the hamster's cage with a murmured, "yeah buddy, missed you too" when all the hamster did was dart out of the soup can he was hiding in, grab the grape, and run back in.

Knowing that she was probably uncomfortable with the level of detail she'd just shared about her background with virtual strangers, I walked up next to Steph and bumped her with my hip. When she looked over at me, I nodded my head to the cage. "Who's this? I hope it's okay, we gave him a couple pellets last night."

"Rex, the wonder hamster," Steph replied with a smile. She turned and nodded toward Steve and Bucky who were finishing cooking in the kitchen, "he likes grapes. Thanks."

Steve's lips tightened a little, but I just shook my head, so he smiled and said, "it's no problem, Steph."

Steph looked curiously at where they were working, "Is that a what-cha-ma-call-it? skillet? And what is that long thing? A griddle? I know you didn't find those here."

Voice tinged with obvious amusement, Sam said from the couch, "Steph, you had one pot that had definitely seen better days. And like three plates. We needed to feed what is almost a small army, so I picked up a few things."

"Yeah, I don't cook."

Bucky snorted out a laughed, "no shit," that had Steve elbowing him in the ribs.

Sam got up from the couch and pulled Steph into a hug, "I hear congratulations are in order?"

Steph's face lit up, and I could see Clint's tension at the conversation and his uncertainty over how Steph would interact with everyone ease a little. Sam's comment brought about a round of hugs for Steph and backslaps for Clint as we all congratulated the couple on the new marriage. Steve and Bucky started carrying plates of food out to everyone and when Steph made to sit on the ground, Steve just plucked her up and set her on the couch next to me.

"What?" Steph said in surprise.

Taking pity on her, I just leaned over and stage-whispered, "it's some kind of weird chivalry thing. No matter how many times I take him down on the mats sparring or how many people and aliens I kill in front of him, he still treats me like a fragile little woman. You'll get used to it."

"There's nothing wrong with having good manners," Steve said primly, and I started laughing hysterically, happy when Steph joined in. Steve made a mildly offended sound, but I could see the amusement in his eyes, so I didn't say anything else.

Once we'd all made progress with our plates full of food, Tony asked curiously, "so you have a business degree? What were you doing with it?"

"I was a lingerie buyer for E.E. Martin," she said it in a completely matter-of-fact manner, then glanced around the room and laughed at the reactions the men had. "Straight men always react this way."

"Men are idiots," I responded with a shrug. "I'm very grateful to be adding you into the mix. Evens the numbers a little."

She scoffed, "Between Ranger and his men, I come with like thirty older brothers, so I don't think I really helped you out all that much. Really, I probably made it worse."

"Well, it's not like they'll all be moving into the Tower with you," Steve said jovially.

"Umm, what now?" Steph asked, and Clint was desperately making slashing motions over his neck trying to end the conversation before it got going fully. Just because I saw his motions and understood his predicament didn't mean I was going to help him out because it was a conversation that needed to happen, and given the fact that there was only so much we'd be able to do for this apartment, I was of the opinion that the sooner it happened, the better.

"When you move into Avengers Tower," Tony said slowly. "You did get married, right? Were you not planning to live together?"

"We hadn't actually discussed it yet," Clint said slowly, eyes trained on Steph's extremely expressive face. On it, we could read pretty much the whole host of emotions possible.

She started out at baffled, moved on to angry (I assumed at being told what to do), then went to contemplative, resigned, and finally ended up looking at us calmly and saying, "right, so… Tower."

"Yeah, give us a minute?" Clint said while getting up, setting his plate down, then taking Steph's plate from her and guiding her into the bedroom.

As soon as the door was shut behind them, I turned to Steve and Tony and hissed out, "seriously guys?"

Tony shrugged, "they were gone for the better part of a day. I figured they talked at least _some_, and you have seen this place, right? Why wouldn't she want to leave to live in the lap of luxury with us?"

"Maybe because her friends and family are here, as is her job," Sam reasoned.

"Yeah, but we make up all except for one of her soulmates," Tony whined. "She can't live here, we'll never see her."

"Look at how hard she's worked to make it on her own, Tony." Bucky argued, "she's not going to want to just sit back and live off of Clint."

Tony opened his mouth, and I felt sure he was going to argue that she should, or that he'd give her an allowance, or some such nonsense and I was reminding myself, yet again, not to hurt Tony. Before I could figure out what to say, Steve stepped in, "No, Tony. Whatever it is that you were just thinking, don't. She is a strong, capable woman not some sort of toy or fancy new car you can just buy."

The moment we heard the buzz of Steph's ringing phone was the moment we remembered how thin the walls were. We shifted around awkwardly looking at each other realizing that Steph had very likely heard everything we'd said. I could hear her talking quietly and I looked at Steve questioningly, but he was very pointedly not paying attention. I looked at Bucky, but he just shrugged and indicated he couldn't hear. I heard Clint say something to her, and a couple seconds later, Steph was dashing out of her room, pulling on more sensible work boots than the sneakers she'd come home in.

"What time is your op?" she asked, directing the question toward Steve.

"Deal's set for midnight."

"Okay, great. I should be back in plenty of time to help you with any set-up information you might need. You know, local knowledge type stuff. In the meantime, if you need something, please call my cell or Rangeman. Ranger will help you."

She had her second boot on and was running toward the kitchen while pulling her hair into a ponytail. She opened her cookie jar and pulled out a gun, then she reached in again and pulled out two bullets, shoving them into the gun haphazardly. She checked the charge on the stun gun in her purse and tossed it on the counter, grabbed her keys and was gone. I ran to the window and watched her peel out from her spot in the parking lot. With a sigh I walked over to the counter where she had left her stun gun and picked it up, seeing the low battery indicator. I looked around until I found the charger and plugged it in for her.

"Was her phone at least charged?" I asked Clint.

"Yes," he replied tersely. "And my number is in it. She promised to call if she needed."

"Do you know where she went?" Bucky asked incredulously. When Clint shook his head, he yelled, "she has two bullets in that gun!"

"She said it was low risk, she was just checking out a lead, and she asked me to trust her to do her job."

"If it was low risk, why did she need a gun. She didn't take a gun yesterday."

"No, she had a stun gun and a ton of backup yesterday though," Clint responded before sitting down and rubbing his hands over his face. "She said it's in the same neighborhood as some guys who aren't so happy with her these days."

"By some guys, does she mean gangbangers?" I asked pointedly.

"Look, I don't know. Please can you just fill me in on tonight's op so I don't have to think about the fact that she's out there right now without backup!"

Steve started talking about the intel we'd gotten from Beckham and the surveillance they'd already set up at the deal site. We pulled up the photos and live video feeds and picked out Clint's perch for the night. For about 2 hours, we went through logistics and planned with Sam and Bucky cleaning up the brunch mess while we were doing so. Halfway through the third hour, Clint got massively tense and seemed like he was trying to puzzle something out in his head. When his eyes went wide, he started pulling his boots back on. As soon as Clint's phone rang, he was up grabbing his bow and quiver that he'd left with us yesterday and had the apartment door open, pausing in the doorway.

"Barton," he said tersely. "How'd you get this number? Son of a bitch! You're bringing her back to her apartment? Should she be at the hospital? So take her to the hospital!"

He blew out a frustrated breath and I couldn't help but laugh. Obviously she was well enough to be fighting a trip to the hospital, so it wasn't life threatening, and it definitely served Clint right for all the times that he refused medical treatment. Steve looked at me incredulously, and I shrugged my shoulders, "just seeing more ways that they're made for each other." Clint didn't even turn to look at me, just flipped me off, and I saw Steve stifle his own laugh while giving me a wink. Wanting some comfort from my own soulmate, I pulled Steve onto the couch and moved into his lap.

Clint hung up the phone with a huff and dropped his bow back to the ground. Then he just said, "I'm waiting outside."

I stood up, and Sam said, "I'll go."

"That's fine, I'm sure you'll be a comfort, but I'm going to get one of the jets and I'll get Bruce."

Steve quickly stood, "I'll go, you stay in case she wants help from a female. Call if you need specific supplies. Someone tell Bruce I'm on my way."

Apparently deciding that the usual way was too good for him, he went out to the fire escape and jumped down into the lot, taking off at a sprint. My phone buzzed with a text message from Clint, "_Was that Cap?"_

"_He's getting Bruce."_

"_Okay, well, we'll talk to him again about stairs. Maybe throw in a reminder about parachutes while we're at it."_

"_Does Bruce need anything in particular?"_

"_Probably a good burn cream and a suture kit."_

I winced and looked at Bucky and Tony as I passed on the request to Tony who was on the phone with Bruce.

"Burn cream and sutures?" Bucky asked. "That sounds like… an explosion with shrapnel. At least more bullets probably wouldn't have changed that."

"He didn't say anything more."

We waited in silence until Bucky stood up and moved toward the window. When I heard car doors slamming, I joined him with Tony cramming in behind us looking down at the lot. From our vantage point upstairs, we watched as Clint crouched down in front of the open back door and a moment later, Sam joined him. There was a crowd of men dressed in black gathered around, guarding them.

"That's not good," Tony whispered.

We all let out matching signs of relief when Clint leaned in and assessed the situation then reached in. I could make out Steph's arms reaching around his neck and Sam gently helped her ease out to climb onto Clint like a little koala. Once they made it inside the building we all turned and nervously watched the door. Moments later, Sam was pushing the door open and holding it as Clint walked in giving us a clear shot of his pale face and her back which was a burned, bloody mess. There was enough dirt and grit that I knew Steph had a painful few minutes ahead of her.

I stepped forward and made my eyes ask Clint if he wanted me to handle it for him; I would understand if he didn't want to hurt Steph. He just shook his head and kept walking with her into the bathroom, shutting that door behind him, but leaving the bedroom door open. We heard the water go on, and a few minutes later a muffled sob.

I looked over at Sam, "do we need to go get her car somewhere?"

"No… that's her car she's wearing, so I'm guessing it isn't drive-able. Apparently it was some kind of freak accident while she was out, as far as she could tell at least. Some kids had tied some of those sparkler things onto a remote control car. They were messing around, and drove it under her car when it just stopped working. One of them tried to crawl under the car to get it, and Steph got that pulling him out and shielding him when the car caught fire and exploded. It seems she had a full tank of gas."

"Is the kid okay?" Tony asked.

"Well, he feels awful, but physically he's fine. His mom took him to the hospital just in case, but apparently Steph has a thing against hospitals and was insisting that she wanted Clint. Her phone was toast, but someone at Ranger's office was able to pull his number off the cloud because they wanted to make sure he'd be here if they brought her here."

"At least the kid's okay. And that's nothing that won't heal," I said worrying my lip when we heard more crying from the bathroom.

They were still in the bathroom when Steve walked in leading Bruce and asking, "how is she?"

Another sob came from the other room and Steve winced. Wanting Bruce to know what he was up against and reassure Steve, we quickly explained what had happened. When the water finally shut off, Clint cracked open the door. We all looked over and he sighed and said, "don't look for a minute, guys." At the same time, he beckoned me forward, so I quickly walked over to the door. Between the two of us we were able to get Steph up, into a pair of reasonably covering underwear, and onto her bed. At least her front was fine, which let her lay on it comfortably.

Figuring her modesty was as protected as it was going to be, I went to the door and gestured for Bruce to come in. Clint was squatting down next to the bed, holding Steph's hand gently and brushing her hair away from her face while whispering to her quietly. Bruce walked in slowly and winced when he did a cursory scan of her injuries. He walked up next to Clint and squatted down so he was eye level with Steph.

"That looks like it probably really hurts, can I help?" He smiled at Steph encouragingly and held out a couple pills he'd already had in his hands. "This should help take the edge off, and I'll give you some locals too as I work."

Steph's eyes flicked back to Clint who ran his hand through her hair again and said, "please?"

She nodded her head, and Bruce looked at me, clearly asking me to grab her some water. I heard a tapping sound and recognized Steve's hand holding a water bottle in the doorway from the other room while still giving plenty of privacy. Clint helped Steph drink the water and get the pills down while his free hand gently stroked his words in black on her back which were thankfully untouched.

Bruce pulled on gloves and did a more thorough inspection of the wounds. He paused when he got to the back of her right shoulder blade. Also untouched were the grey words, "That looks like it probably really hurts, can I help?" He ran a finger gently over them but didn't say anything before he started preparing a syringe with the anesthetic he'd promised Steph.

Sighing Steph said, "I know it's you, it just hurts. I'm sorry I didn't say anything right away."

Bruce froze and then relaxed a little, "I figured you knew who I was and weren't interested in being my friend."

"Shit, get back over here right now." Bruce hesitantly squatted down next to her again. "Please don't ever think that again. What you do, what you all do, is so very important to this world. Don't let people tell you anything else, and if they do, tell me and I'll punch them in the face, okay? If the Hulk was a monster, he wouldn't help. I just had to pull together the energy mentally and emotionally to respond, okay?"

He found a good spot on her arm, and patted it gently saying, "thanks, Steph."

Bruce had just finished the first injection when I heard a couple new voices in the living room that I recognized from yesterday. Most of them left a few seconds later, but I heard a soft knock on the door.

"Babe?"

"Yeah, I'm decent enough, you guys can come in."

Clint frowned a little but didn't say anything more. Ranger stepped in and, much to my surprise, kicked off his shoes and climbed on the bed perpendicular to Steph. He had stayed there, waiting for her to turn her head and look at him.

"I was thinking about going for a run, do you want to join me?"

Steph snorted out a laugh, "when have I ever?"

"When your jeans are too tight."

"Whatever, that was like three times."

"Tank's bringing you a present."

"Boston Creme?"

"Of course. I also thought you could use these for a couple days." I raised a brow when he held out Porsche keys- presumably to the Boxster he'd driven yesterday. "I think you've blown up more Cayenne's than Boxsters, so I thought you'd like the opportunity to even that score a little."

"No, Ranger. I'm not blowing up another of your cars. I'll borrow Big Blue for a few days until I can pick something else up."

"Take this until you can find something else. Maybe you'll luck out and find another Rollswagon."

"What in the hell is a Rollswagon?" Tony asked indignantly from the doorway.

Ranger pulled himself back up and sat with his back against the headboard studiously watching where Bruce was working on Steph's back. Without looking up, he said, "it was two cars kind of fused together. Weirdest damn thing I ever saw and not a good car for maintaining a low profile."

"The front was Rolls, the body was all wagon. It was silver with blue swirls and stars on it. And it was a loaner, but I didn't destroy it. Although I'm pretty sure Dougie pushed it off a cliff when I returned it."

"And you returned it in the same shape you got it?" Ranger teased Steph, nodding at Bruce over her head to do the next injection while she was distracted.

After a slight hiss, she said, "that wasn't my fault. Who rams someone's car then attacks them with a tire iron. My crazy skips, that's who!"

Out of morbid curiosity, I just had to ask, "did you catch him?"

"Not right then, no. I was feeling a little whiplash-y. The next time I tried to catch him, he lit my shirt on fire while I was wearing it. Then he broke in here in the middle of the night with a knife. He tried to stab me and/or cut off my nipple, he mentioned both and didn't really seem to care which. I tried to shoot him. I didn't get him though and I couldn't make myself try again when he was unarmed. Then he got my pepper spray from me and left."

"You bring him in eventually?" Sam asked with a grin, leaning against a wall with the other guys who'd all followed Ranger in though we're clearly less comfortable with the situation.

"Of course I did! I broke into his house, busted in on him while he was in the shower, kneed him in the nuts, and dragged his naked ass to jail. I was pissed!"

"Good for you," said Bucky. Steph glared at him and he raised his hands in the universal sign of surrender, "I'm serious, you have no real combat training, right? So you got the guy and didn't get hurt. Good for you."

"What did you mean when you said you tried to shoot him?" Clint asked from the floor.

"He was running at me, and I shot at him. I grazed his toe."

"Well, you know Lastochka," I said. "You'll probably have to work on that; you can't be married to Hawkeye and miss when you shoot."

"I didn't miss, I nicked him."

"Gorgeous, unless you were aiming for his toe, you missed. But we'll work on it, and it'll be fun," Clint said with a playful smile.

"I seriously hate guns."

"Bet I can change that!"

"You're on! What are we betting?"

"I'll think of something I want once I've won."

Steph smile sweetly at him and he pressed a kiss to her forehead. A couple minutes later he tilted his head to the side then looked at where Bruce was still working steadily.

"Uh, Doc?" He said a little panicked.

Bruce looked up in surprise and quickly took Steph's pulse. After observing her a little more, he said, "I think she fell asleep?"

"What'd you give her?" Ranger asked calmly.

"Tapentadol."

"Good choice. Knocks her out but doesn't make her too loopy. And then she says embarrassing stuff while she's loopy, and gets all grumpy about it when she remembers. This way she'll just be dead to the world for a couple hours. You don't need to be so gentle now." So saying, Ranger stood up and stretched before picking up his shoes and walking back out to the living room without a backward glance.

Steve, Bucky, Sam, and Tony all followed him, and Clint and I sat in silence while Bruce finished the stitches. He gave Clint instructions for everything, including the burn cream, then left and shut the door behind him.

"So, Steph and Ranger?" I asked.

Clint shrugged at me, "might have slept together a few times, but they're firmly planted in the land of platonic. Weird to see him climb on the bed, but I'm fine."

I studied his face and his motions as he said that, and I realized he meant it. And that allowed me to really relax about the situation. When Clint got to the point where he needed to put cream on and around my words on Steph, he held out the container to me.

"Thanks," I said with a smile, feeling the part of me that had felt a strong urge to help her ease down just a tad by the time I'd finished up. Gently I poked at Clint's words on Steph's back before less gently poking where I knew her words were on his abdomen. "Those are super compatible locations- you two take advantage of that?"

I didn't really expect him to respond, so I was thrown off by the soft nod of his head. Then his behavior earlier clicked, and if I was right, it was truly impressive and explained fully his lack of jealousy. Such bonds were extremely rare, especially so immediately. Hell, it had taken over a year for Steve and I to fully solidify our bond, and I couldn't really feel him if he was outside the room. "You started getting ready minutes before your phone rang. You knew something had happened."

"I felt panic and fear, one hell of an adrenaline rush, then pain."

"That how Ranger found her too?" After all, people with that type of romantic bond were exceptionally open, and commonly felt similar, but weaker, connections to their platonics as well.

"No, they listen to radios at Rangeman. Someone recognized the plate number when the call went out- apparently there was a cop down the street, so it went out almost immediately. My understanding is that Ranger needs to be near her for her to feel his presence."

"She coming to New York to live with you?"

"Assuming this didn't somehow make her want to stay, yes. Not sure on the timetable though. She had wanted to stay for a couple weeks until her cousin could get a new bounty hunter on, especially when I mentioned our interest in acquiring Rangeman. I'm not sure if this will move the timetable up or back."

I watched as Clint finally stood up from where he was crouched next to Steph. He lost contact with her while he was stretching, and her hand immediately flew out in her sleep and latched onto his. With a smile I watched his face soften at the gesture before he decided just to slide into the bed next to Steph. I let myself out of the bedroom, shutting the door behind myself and strode into the living room to ask Ranger if he had an extra sniper we could borrow for the night.


	6. Tying Up Loose Ends

**Chapter 6 - Tying Up Loose Ends**

_**Clint's POV**_

"Come on Steph, hit me," you know you want to, I said with a smirk.

"No, I really don't."

"Not even a little?"

"Nope."

"What about when I accidentally left that wet spot on the bathroom floor and you stepped on it in your socks the other day"

"The annoyance went away as soon as I changed my sock."

"Hmmm, what about when I beat you at target practice?"

"Clint, of course you beat me at target practice," Steph said with exasperation.

"There it is, now you want to hit me a little more," I kept my smile on my face as I taunted Steph. "Little more."

"Clint, I'm not going to hit you!"

"What if I call you Cupcake?" There was a definite flash in her eye at that.

"See, now, that was just low."

"Did it make you want to hit me?"

"You know, because you're my husband, I think me hitting you might even be legally worse than me just hitting some random stranger on the street."

"Oh come on, sparring is totally legit. Steve and Nat spar all the time."

"First of all, they're not married, right?" I shrugged because who the hell knew Steve Rogers and Natasha Romanov weren't married, but who knew about the dozens of aliases Natasha had set up for them. "Second, you're not asking me to spar, you're asking me to punch you knowing that you aren't even going to try to defend yourself."

"I'm trying to prove a point."

"I know what point you're trying to prove, and I don't agree."

I sighed, "that's why I'm trying to prove it, Steph."

"Well that's why I won't hit you."

"Ah, ha! So it has nothing to do with not wanting to hit me and everything to do with not wanting to be wrong. Isn't that right, Gorgeous?"

She bit her lip and looked away.

"Well, you're hitting someone," I said, looking out at where the various men of Rangeman were watching us like a tennis match. Steph had tricked me into bringing her into Rangeman instead of keeping her in her apartment under the guise of wanting to see her friends. Once we'd gotten there, she'd run searches on a bunch of her skips and now wanted to go pick them up.

"What's going on?" Ranger asked in amusement.

"Steph wants to go into the field, and I don't think it's a good idea because she would hurt herself in a fight." I explained, "I'm trying to get her to hit me so that she sees what I'm talking about, and she's refusing no matter what I throw at her."

"Ah, how convenient; I have just the thing for this." Ranger scanned his eyes around the room and called out, "Tank! Bring over my guest"

Steph's eyes bugged out of her head as the sleazy man started walking toward us with Tank.

"Hey Steph!" he said enthusiastically. "Will you tell these guys we're good? They won't take my business because they think you wouldn't like it, but really I need the best. Help a guy out, I was good to you, right? We had fun."

Before I could blink Steph had launched herself at the man. She got one good punch in before I grabbed her gently by the hips and pulled her back. Tank looked at Ranger who nodded, and he just grabbed the man and shoved him into the elevator, pushing the button for the lobby before stepping back out.

"Whoever is on monitors, make sure that asshole is out of my building within the next two minutes!" Ranger called.

"How did that feel, Steph?" I asked concerned by the minor tightness I could see in her face.

"Fantastic?"

"Uh huh," I said, casting a look at Ranger.

"Bobby!" Ranger called before gesturing for me to take Steph into his office. Knowing she had on a loose sports bra, I carefully helped Steph out of her shirt when Bobby arrived.

Bobby looked everything over before saying, "I don't want to step on any toes here or anything, but I think these stitches can come out if you'd like, Steph. As long as you take it easy for a couple of days, you'll be completely healed by the end of the week. It probably only hurt just then because the stitches pulled a little. But, you know, probably best to stay away from ex's you'll try to murder."

My head whipped back toward the door, "wait, that was Dickie?"

"Yeah," Steph grumbled.

"Well now I wish I'd laid him out before you even got to him, and I certainly regret pulling you off him."

"She could have hurt herself," Bobby reasoned.

"Not as bad as she would have hurt him," I argued. Steph was apparently pleased by my vote of confidence because she immediately pulled me down for a kiss.

"Babe."

"Right, not in Ranger's office," Steph said. "Plus, I want these stitches out please, Bobby."

"Then, let's go to my clinic."

Steph and I started following Bobby out of Ranger's office and across the floor to the elevators when my phone chirped with an incoming text message.

"_Sorry, Buddy. Extraction incoming. 5 min. Roof. Team will watch out for Steph."_

"Mother fucker," I said, apparently much louder than I'd meant to because everyone froze and looked over at me. I winced then turned to Steph, "I'm really sorry, Steph. I gotta go. Please be careful while I'm gone."

"How long?"

"I don't know, I just know that I need to get to the roof within the next four minutes, so I'm hoping the elevator or the stairs can take me there because I don't have my bow. Also, I really hope Nat brought lunch."

Steph opened her mouth, looking like she was going to ask how a bow would help me get on the roof, but then she just shut it again. She pulled me down for a kiss that had everyone catcalling and whispered, "if I have to be careful, you have to be careful."

"You got it. Now, roof?" I asked again hopefully.

Ranger had come up behind us, and said, "Follow me. I'll clear you through."

Giving Steph's hand one last squeeze, I started to follow when one of the men, Hal I believe it was, called out, "just to check, the cursing wasn't because the world is ending again, right?"

"I don't think so," I yelled back. Then with a confident grin I added, "at least not on my watch!"

Ranger turned and just raised a brow at me once we hit the stairwell, and I just shrugged. "I've always found it better to be confident than scared when heading into a mission with zero warning or background. Plus, I didn't want Steph to be nervous. It's always big if we're getting called in, but I'm also fairly certain, from what Nat said about the team watching out for Steph, that it will just be Nat and I on this mission. Maybe Cap, but we're not taking everyone. Which should mean there will be a distinct lack of portals opening and aliens invading."

"Well that's always good."

"I know I prefer it that way."

We reached the roof just as the Quinjet was landing and the loading ramp immediately opened for me. I looked inside and saw only Nat sitting in the pilot's seat. Turning back to Ranger, I said, "see, just two of us. How much trouble could we possibly get in to? Watch my girl for me?" He nodded his head as I got in yelling to Natasha as the ramp closed and strode forward, "just tell me we're not going back to Budapest!"

_**Steve's POV**_

We'd had the briefing after the alert came in, and as much as we tried to avoid it, the only two who it really made sense to send were Natasha and Clint. Sure, Bucky was a very good shot as well, but he wasn't on quite the same level of Clint, and he was exclusively guns. With the new programmable arrows Tony had designed for Clint, he was kind of like an extra-long range Swiss army knife. Which made him perfect to assist Natasha in this infiltration. I'd tried to convince Nat that I should go with them as extra back-up, but she'd seen through that. Not to mention that even though my stealth skills had improved greatly, I was still less of a precision tool than Nat, and that's what she'd need to be. Plus, as she pointed out, Clint would feel better the more of us were around to watch after Steph if something came up while she was still injured.

After she left in the jet, rolling her eyes after I checked over her equipment for the fourth time, I'd gone down to the gym for a workout. I'd always found the punching bag to be a great way to deal with the frustration of not being able to help Nat. That or sparring, which I eagerly switched to when Bucky walked in and pointed to the boxing ring. We hadn't been sparring for all that long when Bucky said, "and how many times has Nat gone out on a mission without you since you met? Just imagine how Steph is feeling."

That drew me up short and unfortunately took me off my guard long enough for Bucky to get a lucky shot in. With his metal hand, so I ended up sprawled on the floor. As I lay on the floor shaking it off, I realized Bucky was right. So I took the hand he offered me and walked over to the elevator to get cleaned up. An hour later, I was on my bike headed toward Trenton, New Jersey. Because it was where Clint's tracker had been when Nat left, I stopped first at Rangeman Security.

I was parking my bike down the street when a black truck rolled up next to me. The window rolled down and Ranger leaned over to see out past the passenger seat better.

"Everything okay, Captain?"

"You can call me Steve, Ranger." I reminded him yet again.

"My men and I operate pretty exclusively on call signs, Cap."

I supposed that was okay then. It wasn't like he was giving me a rank or being annoyingly proper, that was just how they did it. I was just one of the guys, so I nodded my head in understanding.

"Everything okay, Captain?" he asked again.

In that moment I realized that if something were to have happened to Clint, I probably _would_ be the one the team sent to notify Steph. "Well shit, I shouldn't have come alone, she's going to freak, isn't she? Everything's fine, Ranger. I just wanted to see how she's holding up since this is Clint's first trip out since they got together."

Ranger nodded his head in understanding. "I'll call her while you head over and let her know it isn't bad news, okay? But she's not here, she left as soon as Bobby took out her stitches. I'm fifty-fifty on whether or not she'll be at the bonds office even though Bobby told her she should wait a couple more days before going after a skip."

Thinking about my reaction which was to go to the gym, I looked over at Ranger and said, "I'm guessing bonds office. What's the address?"

He rattled one off and I mentally went through the map I'd studied of Trenton. I nodded my head and kicked the bike stand back up. Ten minutes later, I was pulling up outside Plum Bail Bonds, looking inside and seeing two women who, based on Natasha's descriptions, I was fairly certain were Lula and Connie watching me unabashedly. Climbing off the bike, I strode into the office.

"Good afternoon, ladies," I said as friendly as I could manage, "is Steph here?"

"Holy hell, Skinny Ass White Girl wasn't lying. You're Captain America. That husband of hers didn't get himself dead already on his mission, right?"

I smiled as I said, "no, Clint should be fine. They probably haven't even really gotten started yet. I just came to see how Steph's doing."

I looked over at Connie who pointed to the closed door and told me she'd just gone in, so I settled myself on the couch to wait. Through the door I could hear a lot of yelling. The man was laying it on really thick about how he'd taken Steph on when she had nothing and she repaid him by quitting for some guy. At first, I assumed I was only hearing it because of my super hearing, but from the way Connie kept glancing at me nervously, I realized she could hear it as well.

"He's her cousin?" I asked, more than a little outraged at family treating family that way. Connie sighed and nodded, so I asked, "Didn't he not want to give her the job in the first place?"

"Yeah, but despite what she thinks, she's actually gotten a lot better at it. She's gotten almost every skip she's been sent to pick up before Vinnie lost money, which makes her hands down the best low-level bond bounty hunter we've had."

"If she's so good, why is money so tight?"

"He only gives her the lower bonds, and gives Ranger the bigger ones. And he hasn't been posting enough of those lately for her to get by comfortably."

"Has he had the opportunity to do so?"

"Yep."

"So, he isn't giving her enough cases to get by on, but now that she wants to leave, he's throwing a fit?"

"He's an ass," Connie said.

"Will you be able to replace Steph?"

"Lula's going to take the regulars who don't cause a fuss in addition to her filing job. As long as Steph gets the four that she has files on right now, once she can go on the streets again, like she's promised she will, we can probably find someone new before we run into any problems. Especially since Ranger offered to help us with the search and have Rangeman pick up any slack in the meantime."

Plan forming in my mind, I pulled out my phone and typed out a few texts before I asked my next question. "Does he at least ever help her out when she can't go because she's hurt? I mean, she got hurt on the job."

Lula snorted and said, "man's a pig, so of course not."

"She have a car yet?"

"No," Lula said, "she didn't really want to buy one before moving to Manhattan, so she's borrowing from Ranger."

I stood up gesturing toward the door, "may I?"

Both women eagerly nodded, with Lula adding, "I hope you make him pee his pants."

I sincerely hoped it didn't come to that, but I appreciated the sentiment nonetheless. When I got to the door, I politely knocked.

"GO THE FUCK AWAY, WOMAN, I'M BUSY DEALING WITH MY TURNCOAT COUSIN!" the voice yelled from inside.

I glanced sideways at Connie who said, "yeah, he thinks that's me trying to get him to lay off Steph."

Trying the handle and finding it unlocked, I swung the door open and put on my best disappointed face. I was a little taken aback when Steph looked up, saw my face and laughed. Then she stopped, really took in the fact that I was there, and went sheet white.

"He's fine, Steph," I met her eyes until she calmed down and nodded, then I put the disappointed face back on and turned to the man behind the desk. He kind of did look like a weasel. "Is that how you talk to the women who work for you?"

"Yup!" Steph said, popping the 'p' enthusiastically.

"It would be in your best interest if I never heard you speak to a woman or anyone else that way again," I said calmly not allowing the satisfaction I felt at the way Vinnie shrank back in his seat to show. "Now, Steph has given you notice and promised to bring in a few more skips for you, which given my understanding of how she came to get this job and how you treat her, is much more generous than you deserve. How you were speaking to her is not how you should speak to family. And given why she's leaving, I would think her family would be happy for her."

Apparently deciding she was done with the conversation, Steph started to stand, taking the arm I offered with a smile as she did so. "I'll bring you these four, collect my check, and I'm done, Vinnie. I'm sorry you're upset, and I do appreciate you giving me a job when I needed it. But you never wanted me in the first place, and I was never going to do this forever. And you knew it."

We walked outside and Steph turned to me warily, "what's up? Clint's really okay?"

"As far as I know, yes. And they'll be fine, but I know how I feel when Natasha has to go on a mission without me, and she's been doing it somewhat regularly for a couple years now. So, I thought I'd come see how _you_ were holding up. I'm sorry I scared you; Ranger was supposed to call and warn you."

"I got the call as I was heading in, so I didn't answer. I figured he was going to try to get me to go home and relax even though I honestly feel well enough to do this."

I studied her face and saw no signs that she was lying to me, so I nodded my head before walking to the door of the SUV I was pretty sure was hers, and waiting for her to unlock the door so I could open it for her. As she buckled up, she looked at me and said, "what's going on?"

"Let's go to your apartment to talk for a few minutes, okay?"

Steph sighed, clearly thinking I was going to try to talk her into resting, but started the car and drove sedately back to her apartment while I followed on my bike. When we walked up to her door, she paused. "Hey, Steve?"

"Yeah?"

"You have your shield?"

"No. I left it in Manhattan so that I could maybe not be recognized today, why?"

"Not to alarm you, but I think there's someone in my apartment. I think it's okay, but yeah."

I reached down and pulled a gun from one of my ankle holsters, unhappy when Steph pulled just her stun gun out of her purse. I tensed up reaching for the doorknob, but before I could open it, Bucky called out, "It's just Sam and I!"

Steph kept her stun gun out so that she could walk in and set it to charge. While she was doing so, I peeked into her cookie jar.

"Steph, where is your gun? Why didn't you pull that?"

Steph pantomimed an explosion, and I immediately realized she'd left it in the car the other day while she was in the field. And it had exploded. Not trusting myself to speak yet, I took some calming breaths.

"Yeah, Ranger reacts the same way when I tell him one of my guns exploded."

"I would imagine it is because he is similarly uncomfortable with the fact that you were in the field without it," I said. "It's a good thing then that we stopped here before going out."

Steph perked up, "you're not going to make me rest?"

"Your movement seems fine, a little stiff, but not too bad. Do you still have stitches you can rip?"

"Bobby took them out right after Clint left."

"Then no, it's not like any of us would stay out of the fight this long anyway. Clint's just worried about losing you before he really has you. And I'm guessing Bucky has an extra gun that you can use."

"Uh, we're married. Clint has me."

"Not yet," Sam said, walking up to give Steph a hug. "Yes, you're married, but you don't know each other all that well yet and you don't live together. I mean he's been going back and forth all week."

"He has?" Steph asked.

Sam shifted awkwardly, "uh, yeah? I'm guessing he was leaving after you fell asleep each night then, which explains the weird hours. Probably because he didn't want you to feel bad about him staying here with you while you were hurt. He had stuff he still needed to be doing for the team, so someone would fly here, get him, and then someone else would bring him back a few hours later."

"Oh," Steph sounded so small in that moment that I pulled her into a little hug. "Well, I just have to catch these four guys, and then when he gets back, if he still wants me to move in with him, I can move in."

Bucky snorted out a laugh, "Of course he wants you to move in, Steph. He had Natasha and Pepper in his apartment all week 'de-mancave-ing it' to use his own words. And no one willingly gives Natasha free reign in their living space. Except Cap, of course."

"I was thinking we'd help you catch those four guys, then, I don't know," I gave her my best, most charming smile, "help you pack your things and move them to the Tower?"

"Oh, stow the smile, Rogers and save it for Natasha."

This time it was Sam who laughed, "yeah, that doesn't work on Natasha either."

Switching tactics, I put on a sad, dejected face. Steph looked at me and sighed then pointed, "that's not fair! Fine, you win this round." Then she muttered about hoping we never figured out that all we had to do was say "please," and I filed that information away for later. It was bound to come in handy.

I reached over Steph to bump fists with Bucky and Steph rolled her eyes, but sat down on the couch. When she pulled out the files, and spread them out, Bucky and I sat on either side of her and Sam leaned against the wall next to us. For the next hour, we stayed silent as Steph took us through each file, her history with the skips if she had one, and laid out how she thought we should go after each one. When she finished, she looked nervously at me and said, "so?"

"You're good at your job; I'm sorry you have to leave it to move, but I think we'll all be glad to know you're living somewhere safe and to get to see you more often."

"Trust me, as you're about to find out, I am not good at the execution phase of my job."

"Seems to me you probably would be if you bothered to learn how to fight. But this," I said, tapping on the folders spread out on the table, "this is good work, and your plans are solid. If you're willing, I want you to do this for us when you move in. I can think of several missions that could have gone better, if we'd had someone who checked this type of stuff out and got this kind of detail for us before we left." I tapped the table again.

Steph looked like she was going to protest that one of us could do it, but Sam interrupted. "The spies are decent, and they'd probably all three work side-by-side with you on some of the cases, but they're jaded and have a messed up view of a lot of things. Don't look at me like that, Bucky, you _know_ I'm right. And the research part isn't really their specialty. Plus, they're impatient and would rather just move immediately."

Standing up, I laid my final blow for the moment, "just think about it. I don't lie, and especially not about things like this that are so vital to our safety. I wouldn't tell you that you were right for the job or try to get you to take it if I wasn't sure that it would be a good fit. But just remember, better intel and reports will make it more likely that Clint comes home safely every mission."

I saw Steph wince, and Sam leveled a look on me that clearly said, "don't you put that on her." But I knew what I was doing. After all, I was a master tactician. Steph needed the push otherwise she wouldn't take the job out of, in this case completely misplaced, pride.

Steph looked pensive as she stood back up and wandered over to her stun gun and unplugged it again, sliding it into her purse.

"Can't you at least wear that on a holster so you can get to it more easily?" Bucky said sounding pained.

"Holsters make me feel like Annie Oakley. I hate it."

Pointing at her seriously, Bucky said, "if Clint won't do it, then you and I are going to have a very serious conversation about personal safety once you move into the Tower."

When Steph stuck her tongue out at him in retaliation, I said, "real mature, Steph. We just want to make sure you're safe."

She threw her hands up and muttered something along "heaven help me from overbearing men with hero complexes" that we all chose to ignore.


	7. Homecoming

**Chapter 7 - Homecoming**

_**Natasha's POV**_

Truth be told, we hadn't had to travel very far for this mission. We'd needed to infiltrate a compound _under_ a winery and lake in Hammondsport, New York. After a few flights over the area with the jet cloaked, we'd worked out a plan of attack. Unfortunately it was one of those missions where, as long as everything went right, we'd be arriving and leaving individually. I'd taken the jet and stashed my motorcycle somewhere where Clint could retrieve it before incorporating myself into a tour group. I would enter and leave with the group, accomplishing the mission during the tour time.

Clint, on the other hand, would be gliding in, ditching the glider over the winery to crash into the nearby lake. Local authorities would be distracted by a fruitless rescue mission if things went sideways and we had to cause a scene, and Hawkeye would be perched at a distance, but able to assist me if necessary. Of course, he'd have to make his way out of the tree and hike his way out to the motorcycle, so he would be a couple of hours behind me.

It was well after midnight when I made it back to the Tower, and because I'd confirmed that Clint had made it back to the motorcycle and was well on his way back with no one tailing him, I went ahead and crawled into bed. I woke Steve up long enough to show him how much I missed him while I was gone, and had barely drifted off to sleep wrapped comfortably in his arms when the Tower alarm started going off.

Steve and I were scrambling out of bed and pulling on our uniforms as JARVIS announced that Clint had requested our presence in the command floor and would be arriving within minutes. We were all sitting around, waiting, feeling the odd mix of sleepiness and adrenaline keying up our bodies, and not really needing to fill the silence.

As soon as the doors to the elevator opened, Clint started yelling, "you were supposed to watch out for her! Natasha said you'd watch out for her!"

Immediately very concerned, I sat up straight, "what's wrong? Where's Steph? What happened?"

"I don't fucking know where she is, but she's not in her apartment which has been completely cleaned out. They even took Rex!"

Next to me, Steve sighed and put his head in his hands. "Clint, protocol says you come home and debrief before you go anywhere else post mission."

"Do you honestly think I give a tiny rat's ass about protocol right now, Cap?! STEPH IS MISSING!"

Figuring out what had happened I reached over and smacked Steve upside the head, "you can't just do that without telling him. I think if you go down to your floor, Clint, you'll find Steph."

Steve rubbed the back of his neck, "I really am sorry, Clint. We weren't expecting you until midday tomorrow at the earliest, and we thought you'd come here and we could tell you."

"She's here?" Clint asked slowly.

"Yes."

"Where the alarms have been going off for how long on her first night here, while she's alone?"

"I may not be good at this?" Steve said causing Tony to snort out a laugh.

"Not to worry, Clint. JARVIS doesn't sound an Assemble alarm if an Avenger isn't on the floor so as to not cause panic. She's probably sleeping still."

"Yeah right," I said in disbelief. "You moved her here, to a completely new place while Clint was on a mission? And left her there alone? With her history of being attacked and kidnapped there's no way she's asleep, trust me. Doesn't matter how safe she knows the Tower is, she almost certainly won't have been able to fall asleep."

Clint wasn't listening anymore, he simply strode to the elevator and left us sitting in the war room. I kicked my feet up on the giant conference table and leaned back in my chair looking at the teammates that were left in the room, "so, good job guys, as always." It was almost adorable the way they tried to meddle and matchmake but always fell victim to amateur mistakes.

"Hey, we got her to move in," Steve argued.

"Okay, but you could have, you know, left a note or something. Maybe text messaged Clint and I so we'd find out when we turned our phones back on post mission? _Obviously_ he was going to go there first, they're newly bonded soulmates. They're still in that phase where they're going to be instinctively drawn to each other to complete the bond over and over. You know that."

They all looked suitably ashamed because they _did_ all know that, so I cut them some slack. It was an annoying phase, when you weren't the one going through it, that pretty much all romantic soulmate matches went through, and the stronger the bond, the longer it lasted. So I was expecting it to take at least a couple months to work through their system. At least. "Still, at least she's safe. Now, I would like to go back to sleep. We can debrief and start processing the data I grabbed after breakfast tomorrow, right Steve?"

When Steve agreed by standing and turning toward the elevator, I took the opportunity to jump onto his back, knowing he'd catch me for a piggyback ride.

"You're crazy if you think I'm not posting that picture of Captain America giving a _smiling_ Black Widow a piggyback ride everywhere on the internet."

Steve laughed, but I was less than thrilled and moved to launch myself at Tony. Ever the peacemaker, as long as he wasn't the angry one, Steve just clamped onto my legs to prevent me from getting free.

He may be able to keep me from attacking in this position, but he couldn't stop me from glaring at Stark and saying, "Oh, I'm sorry, did you _want_ to die today? Because I can make that happen."

It didn't surprise me at all when we found ourselves alone on the elevator after that. Or when Steve slid me around to his front so he could shove me up against the wall and kiss me.

"You love it when I scare them like that, don't you," I murmured against his mouth. He made a sound that I took to be an agreement, so I laughed and said, "you know, you're not supposed to play favorites."

"I don't have a favorite," Steve said, shifting to carry me out the elevator doors as they opened, "after you."

**Steph's POV**

The day had been thoroughly exhausting. The beginning of the day, after Clint left, I'd spent grabbing skips at a way faster rate than ever before. I had to admit that walking each skip into the police station with my head held high had felt great, and I'd been grateful for the help my platonic soulmates had given me, and the fact that they'd stayed out of sight for my victory marches. I could hear whispers following me by the time I brought the second one in still without a scratch (other than those still healing from the explosion the previous week) or any substances all over me. When it came time to go into Plum Bail Bonds, however, Steve had insisted on walking in with me and waiting with me for my check to be written out to make sure that Vinnie didn't raise a fuss again. As I probably should have expected, he even politely turned his back so none of us would be embarrassed when Connie, Lula, and I found ourselves in tears. After all, it was the end of an era.

The marathon skip-retrieval was followed by packing my entire apartment up... or the parts that I cared about keeping. Thankfully I hadn't had to do all the carting of stuff around. In fact, once the Rangemen had somehow found out what was going on, they'd shown up to help and brought Mary Lou with them. I'd been given 20 minutes with Mary Lou to pack anything in my room and bathroom that I didn't want anyone else finding or getting into, after which I hadn't had to do much more than point and label boxes. Well, and drink some of the champagne that Mary Lou had brought with her.

Once it seemed that things were winding down, Sam walked over to where Mary Lou and I were sitting.

"I hope you don't mind Steph, but I talked to your super and got that all taken care of for you. I know it really wasn't my place, but after how Steve told us giving notice at your job went, I figured it was something I could to do spare you another potentially unpleasant situation like that today. We were worried that he was going to be a little upset by the short notice, but he actually seemed relieved."

Mary Lou let out a hiccuping laugh and slapped her hand over her mouth. Then she cleared her throat and said, "Steph doesn't just blow up cars; this place has taken _numerous_ hits as well. I'm sure he'll be happy not to have to deal with that anymore"

"I don't blow them up! Other people who want to blow me up do," I said throwing my hands in the air. "Including his old army teammates!"

Ranger looked up to see pointing at him and frowned, "I've apologized about that dozens of times, and it was only the one teammate. The other one you met during that whole ordeal liked you."

"He blew up her apartment?" Bucky asked quietly.

"He tried to kill her and ended up blowing himself up in the entryway with a grenade," Ranger said. "It was not pretty."

"So," Sam said, clearly trying to maneuver the conversation away to safer territory. "Are we taking this couch? Looks like you've had it for a while."

"Definitely wasn't new when I got it, dude, and I'm going to go out on a limb and say Clint's apartment has a couch that is about three million times better than this and actually comfortable?"

Having confirmed that we didn't really _need_ any of my stuff in Clint's apartment, I was relieved to be able to have the Rangemen cart most of it to the dump. I convinced everyone to let me buy them dinner at Shorty's when we finished, so it was getting late by the time we got to Manhattan. Because I hadn't brought all that much stuff with me, it didn't take long to bring upstairs. And I didn't want to poke around Clint's stuff too much, so I left it all neatly in the corner. Except for Rex. I did clear off a tabletop in the entryway to set Rex up in his cage.

I'd been so exhausted, but I knew there was no way I was going to fall asleep with Clint still gone and being in a new place that was almost creepily big. I hadn't done much more than slip off my jeans, brush my teeth in the half bath off the living room, and crawl onto the couch pulling down the blanket from the back and wrapping it around me.

As long as I'd been busy during the day, I'd been able to not focus on Clint being gone too much. Anytime I'd checked that corner of my brain, he'd been focused. Wanting to distract myself in the hope of at least getting a little sleep, I turned on the TV, grateful to find that it was equipped with Netflix. I set myself up to just binge watch some TV show in Clint's queue, not really caring what was in front of me as long as there was _something_ on and supplying some light and noise in the empty space. Around an hour or so later, the feeling I was getting from Clint through our bond turned a little more satisfied, so I hoped that the mission was going well and he was safe for the night.

It was because of the comfort I drew from that feeling that I finally managed to drift off, but I was startled awake couple hours later, and I wasn't sure why. Then I realized, Clint was transmitting nothing other than blinding fear across the bond. Oh man, I hated feeling that coming off of him and not being able to help in anyway or even knowing what was going on. Twenty minutes later, it cut out completely and was replaced with relief. I'd just started to settle again when the elevator door opened up into the apartment because oh, hadn't I mentioned, the "apartment" was an entire floor of the Tower. I didn't even have time to worry that it was anyone arriving to tell me bad news because I just knew it was Clint. In a flash, I launched myself off the couch and ran at him with a squeal of delight.

As I made my way toward him, I saw a big smile break out across Clint's face. Of course, I threw myself into his arms, ignoring the fact that he was still dressed in his combat clothes and heavily armed. His mouth lowered, still smiling as it met mine, and when I started trying to climb him, he gently picked me up. After a few minutes of us just standing there, wrapped around each other in the entryway, Clint pulled back. "Steph, I gotta take a shower, I'm so gross right now."

"Take me with you, I could use one too. I wasn't expecting you until tomorrow."

"Well, I can go and come back tomorrow if you want."

"Nope! You have to stay now. I missed you so much and it wasn't even a full day."

"Me too, Gorgeous."

Once we made it to the bathroom, we started frantically pulling each other's clothes (and weapons) off. I'd only used the bathroom off the living room earlier, not realizing that there was a larger master bathroom though, I'll admit, it made sense because there was the tub Clint had told me about. Clearly I was gaping because Clint used a finger to push my chin up and shut my mouth.

"Why do you look like you haven't seen this place before?"

"Oh, well, I didn't want to get into all your stuff, and I knew I wasn't going to sleep with you gone, so I just set everything in a corner, used the bathroom in the entry, and settled myself on the couch."

"It's _our_ home, Steph. You can touch anything, move anything, or do anything you want in here!"

Licking my lips, I slid the only thing Clint had left on, his boxers, over his hips and off. "Well, I know what I want to do right now, so let's go."

"Alright, we'll talk later then," Clint said before picking me back up and stepping inside the shower which turned itself on at a perfect temperature as soon as the door was shut. There was water cascading around us from what felt like every direction, and I let out an extra long moan for just how heavenly this shower was. While I was distracted, he quickly and haphazardly soaped up and rinsed off his own body before turning back to me where I was still just enamored with the shower and smiling while letting the water run over me. "Clearly, I've just created my own competition here, guess I'll have to work a little harder to get your attention."

So saying, he reached into a cut-out in the wall and came away with some sort of body wash. He lathered up his hands and surprised me by starting by picking up my left arm and massaging me from hand all the way up to my shoulder. I'd honestly been expecting him to start with my breasts. When he finished the first arm, he picked up my right and repeated the process. Reaching for more soap, he nudged me to spin around, and slowly and carefully washed my back. From the speed and where he paused and lingered, I knew he was going over each of the places where my stitches had been removed. On each fresh, raw scar, he pressed a gentle kiss, lowering to his knees as he moved down my body, and allowing one free hand between my legs to prepare me for what I was eagerly anticipating.

Looking over my shoulder and at him, I smiled when he looked up at me. "Does this hurt?" he asked while gently pressing on one of the sections that had been a deeper wound. When I shook my head, he increased the pressure a little at a time, pausing incrementally for me to reassure him that it didn't hurt. We repeated the process in a few places before he was apparently satisfied. Rising up from where he was kneeling, Clint put more soap on one hand while wrapping the other around my waist and pulling me back into him. Once I got the idea and took a step back, his hand that was pulling me shifted to adjusting himself such that as I slid into his body, I also slid onto his erection.

I released a breath on another long moan and proceeded to push my entire body as firmly into him as possible, enthralled by the sensation of our soulmarks coming into contact again. In response, his hands came up, slick with soap and started roaming across my body. Initially he had one on each breast, massaging then tugging and pinching my nipples seemingly randomly. Never quite knowing what was coming next had my anticipation ratcheted way up. We weren't moving in any other way, and when one of his hands moved down to toy with my clit the pleasure was overwhelming, forcing me to lean forward. Obviously anticipating the movement, Clint moved with me, staying pressed along every inch of my back. His fingers picked up their pace and I could feel the urgency not only in his motions but across our mental connection as well.

As soon as his mouth, which had been nuzzling gently along one side of my neck, settled more firmly with the sole purpose of leaving a mark, I tipped over the edge. His hand that was on my breast slid down to anchor my waist as he threw in a couple of thrusts that kicked my orgasm up to another level and had me screaming out as he joined me. I allowed my head to drop and rest on my arm that was propped against the wall as I caught my breath. Suddenly the entire day's emotional as well as physical toll hit me and I was utterly exhausted. Obviously sensing this, Clint shut the water off, promising we'd do hair tomorrow and kept an arm supporting me as we stepped out of the shower.

While we were toweling off, I managed to pull myself together enough to ask, "was the mission alright? You seem okay."

"Piece of cake, and I let Natasha do all the real work." Clint responded before wrapping me up in his arms and walking me out to his bed. He pulled out a corner of the comforter, and I slid into the middle of the bed.

"Oh my God," I groaned, "I think this is the best bed I've ever been in. If I had come in earlier, I might have actually fallen asleep."

There was so much more to say to each other, but for the moment, we both needed sleep. Clint drew me back to spoon with him, snuggled his face into my hair, and I felt him fall asleep just moments before I drifted off myself.

* * *

**A/N:** Just a quick note- I'm going to be changing from Tuesday/Thursday updates to Tuesday/Friday for now. Just to more evenly space them in the week. :) So when Thursday comes and you don't see an update, don't worry (if you would have done so anyway) because it will be there the next day for you!


	8. Debrief and Some Fun

**Chapter 8 - Debrief and Some Fun**

_**Clint's POV**_

Waking up to Steph grinding against me was probably my new favorite thing in the world, so I didn't feel even the tiniest bit guilty for taking advantage of the situation to start both our days off pleasurably. Plus, it was late enough by the time we woke up, I figured another hour couldn't really matter that much. Once we were sufficiently sated, for the time being, I guided Steph back into the shower. Because she didn't have any clothes unpacked yet, I tossed her a pair of sweats and a shirt of mine to wear for the time being breakfast, charmed by how adorable she looked in them.

"Alright, Steph," I said, watching as she pulled her hair into a ponytail and managing to avoid rolling my eyes as she put on some makeup, figuring I was getting off easy if it was just mascara and lipgloss. "So, how much of the Tower did the guys show you yesterday?"

"Uh, well, the garage, of course. And, ummm, this floor."

"That's it?"

"It was really late, and they'd already spent their entire day hunting down skips with me and helping me move, so I didn't want to take up any more of their time. I told them I was tired so that they wouldn't feel the need to babysit me."

"First, you're going to have to learn, every single one of my teammates will know when you're lying. You aren't good at it, and their lives often rely on them being able to detect lies. Plus you're their soulmate, so you're going to get caught every time."

"I was tired."

"Yeah, but you didn't want them to leave so you could sleep, so you weren't telling the truth. And they'll know. Knowing Rogers, he'll have some whole scenario in his mind about how you're upset with him. It's going to be a thing."

"Second, what were you going to eat? I'm not sure there's any food in here, and Rex's pellets don't look like they taste very good."

"I'm sure one of them would have come this morning and helped me figure things out. Or I could have gone out and gotten something."

"Gorgeous, you got in last night because you were with the team. We need to make sure your clearance is properly set-up before you try leaving on your own and getting back in. JARVIS knows you, but Tower security might not yet and they tend to be jumpy."

"JARVIS is in the Tower too?"

I put my arm around Steph and walked her with me over to the elevator. The doors opened automatically, and I said, "of course JARVIS is in the Tower- how did you think that happened? Or the shower turned on?"

"Was he, uh, watching us in the shower last night?" Steph asked nervously, unfortunately for her just as the doors opened again onto one of the communal floors.

"What happened in the shower last night?" Tony asked with a wiggle of his eyebrows for Steph who turned beet red. He softened the teasing by actually giving her a hug, which caught me by surprise because they hadn't spent much time together and Stark generally didn't like to be touched. It had to be the whole platonic thing coming into play. "To what do we owe the pleasure of your company this fine 'morning,' Sweetie Pie?" Tony asked, putting air quotes around the morning which caused me to look at my watch and wince. It was a little later than I'd figured.

Steph's brows furrowed in confusion, "the fact that I live here now?"

Tony let out a celebratory whoop and spun Steph in a circle then tried to do the same with me. I sighed and guided Steph over to the kitchen where the chefs had left a spread of brunch foods, loading up plates for both of us. Once we sat down and started eating, I looked at Cap and said, "I don't get it, you're this master strategist. This has to be one of the most poorly executed plans I've seen."

"I think where I went wrong is I didn't make a plan, I just kind of went with my gut and tried to make it happen. And then once I saw her in action with her job, I started making plans for how we could use her for the team and I kinda forgot about the rest. Plus, Steph seemed… tired… last night."

"You forgot about things like, oh, I don't know, telling her where anything was in the Tower such as food and emergency routes. Oh and other human beings or the fact that all she had to do was ask JARVIS if she needed anything. Did you even tell Tower security about her and set up her clearance?"

Steve just sighed and Natasha hid her smile behind her mug. "Don't worry, Lastochka, I will show you around."

"Yeah, no, that seems like an awful idea," I said warily. "In fact, I don't think the two of you should be allowed to play together unsupervised."

This time Natasha didn't hide her smile at all, and when I glanced over at Steph her eyes were filled with just as much mischief. Then she turned serious as she looked between Sam, Bucky, and Steve with her eyes settling on the last. "I wasn't trying to brush you guys off or seem ungrateful last night, and I'm sorry if I came off that way. You'd just given me so much of your time, and I didn't want you to feel obligated to have to hang around. I was sure you had much more important things to do."

"Steph, we like spending time with you, and you aren't a burden to any of us," Sam reassured her.

"Hell, I had fun," Bucky said. "Especially when that one tried to run. And the pizza after. Some of your friends there are pretty entertaining."

"Steph said you helped her bring in some skips?" I clarified.

"Yeah, the last four are in jail, and I'm officially no longer Vinnie's problem!" Steph said, but from the tightness around her eyes I could see she had mixed feelings. If I had to guess, I'd have said it was due to the uncertainty of what she'd do know, which was why I hadn't been pushing her to reach this point on any timetable other than her own.

"More like Vinnie is no longer your problem," Steve said in a tone that made me think I had to follow up with him later. Vinnie must have said or done something pretty bad for Cap to get so displeased with him so quickly.

The rapid paced sound of high heels coming from the elevator indicated that Pepper was on her way in, something that didn't usually happen at this time of day. She strode with great purpose toward Steph and stuck out her hand, "Hi, you must be Stephanie. I'm Pepper Potts, CEO of Stark Industries as well as Tony's romantic soulmate. The team has been singing your praises all week and I'm thrilled to meet you. First and foremost I want to offer you my congratulations on finding each other and your marriage.

"Now, Tony and JARVIS informed me that you've moved in, finally, so I took the liberty of setting some things up for you. Tony had already done some set-up with JARVIS, and as you're probably aware, JARVIS is available to you throughout the Tower. All you have to do is say his name and ask for whatever you want, and he'll assist you. He has cameras in public areas of the Tower, and can turn on cameras in the private areas under a very strict set of protocols, but otherwise on the private floors, he uses infrared and non-photographic means like biometrics to identify and keep track of us all. I've notified tower security of your presence, and you should have free reign, but here's an ID card just in case. It would be best to keep that on your person when you leave until all the staff recognize you. These guys will, I'm sure, give you a tour of the tower, but it can be a bit much for people who weren't in on the design phase or don't specialize in learning building schematics, so here's a cheat packet I pulled together for you. It includes a directory as well as maps of the floors you're most likely to want to visit. And, like I said, you can always just ask JARVIS. I hope that helps, and I'm sorry but I've got to run to a meeting. I'll be contacting you to set up a time to get to know each other a bit more soon!"

And then she was gone just as quickly as she'd arrived giving Steph a hug, Tony a kiss, and the rest of us a wave on the way. Steph sat there just blinking for a couple of seconds before Tony sat down at the table and said, "yeah, that's my Pepper. Frighteningly efficient as always." He slid the stack of papers over and flipped through them curiously, "Oh, I forgot about the pool! And the bowling alley! We do not take advantage of this place nearly enough."

Once she'd retrieved the papers, Steph was flipping through them, "what are 'desert' and 'urban setting' and 'suburban setting' and 'family home' that are all listed as spanning multiple floors?"

"Originally, Stark was going to run some of Stark Industries out of the building and have a bunch of open public spaces, but when some low-level villains kept targeting the place before it even opened, we decided that was a bad idea. There are some public meeting and event spaces on the first couple floors, along with Pepper's office. She runs meetings through here, and keeps a small staff onsite. But other than that, most of the extra floors were converted into some really sophisticated practice environments for training." Natasha explained.

"And that, my dear, is where we'll work on making you love firearms," I said enthusiastically.

"I don't like guns because I don't like shooting people," Steph said. "I don't think you're going to change that."

"Well, if Clint fails, I have some ideas, Lastochka." Natasha said, "those floors will also be good to train you on evasion and picking up tails."

Steph looked like she was going to argue the need to learn those skills, but Bruce spoke up, "Steph, even if you weren't romantic soulmates with Clint, just being platonic with any one of us would get you on a lot of people's capture list. And you're a platonic match to all of us. Eventually people will figure that out. You're prime blackmail material for all of us, so you gotta help us out by not getting caught, okay?"

"I hate to break it to you, but I was already prime kidnapping material before I met any of you," Steph said.

"That may be, but I doubt your enemies have been on quite the same level as some of these people, Steph. For instance, there's a general in the army that would really like to get his hands on me, doesn't care how he accomplishes it, and will be retroactively sanctioned to use almost any leverage he deems necessary, if he successfully brings in me and my alter ego." Bruce said.

Steph looked at Bruce with her eyes filled with sadness at the information before nodding her head in understanding. Then she dropped a kiss on my cheek and stood up. When she moved to take my plate, I gently batted her hands away and stood to walk into the kitchen with her.

"We like to eat our meals more or less together when possible, and most of us can't cook, so unless someone gets the desire to cook, Stark has chefs on staff that set up meals for us. There isn't a specific time, we usually just hang around as long as we can, especially at dinner since we're usually done with whatever we're doing for the day. And this place is stocked with pretty much any snack you could want, though I don't recommend eating the Pop-Tarts unless you want to run the risk of incurring Thor's wrath."

"The God of Thunder? I may never eat a Pop-Tart anywhere in the world ever again if that's the consequence."

I chuckled as we headed into the living room again. I eyed the rest of my teammates who were waiting only somewhat patiently and sighed, "Okay, Steph. I hate to abandon you so soon, but we need to have a short debrief from yesterday's mission. So feel free to poke around to your hearts content downstairs and please unpack your things? Put them wherever you want, and I'll come get you for that tour when we're done if that sounds good to you."

"Sounds great."

If I was a little bit distracted during the debrief, no one called me on it, and it didn't make much difference because the op had been simple and I hadn't done much more than sit in a tree. Feeling my attention wander, I started poking at the corner of my brain where Steph was. I wasn't receiving much back from her for the first couple of tries, so I changed tactics. Instead of poking with curiosity, I poked her while thinking about everything I felt for her. Affection. the beginnings of a love like I'd never known before, and yes, lust. I knew the moment she clued in because I felt the same types of feelings reflected back to me. It felt almost like a hug within my brain and it made me feel settled.

I looked up when I noticed that everyone had gone completely silent in the room, and saw them all staring at me.

"What?" I asked, honestly unsure of whether or not they'd asked me a question.

"You're smiling," Tony said. "Like actual, happy smiling. I don't think I've seen that before and it is creeping me out. First Natasha, and now you."

"I smile all the time, Stark."

"Yeah, but not like you mean it just idly like that. It's always in reaction to something or someone and with a distinct purpose," added Bruce.

When I didn't know how to respond, Bucky just said, "we've been trained not to show any emotion. We're told it is a sign of weakness, gives the enemy the advantage, and can get us killed. That's a difficult habit to break."

"So the man's happy, leave him alone," Sam said with Steve nodding along with him.

"They're bonded," Natasha said, causing me to narrow my eyes at her threateningly.

"Tell us something we don't already know," Tony snarked.

Steve was studying Natasha and slowly responded, "she did… she doesn't mean a regular soulmate bond."

"You can communicate with her through it?" Bruce asked straightening up, "after just over a week? I've heard rumors, but I've never met..."

Shifting uncomfortably under their scrutiny, I said, "well, she claims she found me in my perch the first day because she felt me. I didn't notice anything until the first night when we completed the bond."

"Interesting," was all Bruce said in response, and everyone just kept staring at me.

"Actually," Steve cut in, "it's more interesting than that. She found you because she felt you, but she also knew _you weren't dangerous_. The way she said it implied that she can tell when someone is watching her who _is_ dangerous."

"No, you're not studying her or us," I clarified. "Are we done here?"

"We're done here, but now we need to give that wife of yours a tour of our lovely home," Natasha said with a smile that had me immediately remembering what Bruce had said about smiles with a purpose. When she put an arm amiably around my waist, I went on high alert.

"You want something."

"So many things, Clint. And I always get what I want."

"That's what I'm worried about," I grumbled.

Steve clapped me on the shoulder with a, "you should be" that was not at all reassuring.

As we walked into the apartment, I quickly scanned the corner where the boxes were, satisfied to see a stack of broken down cardboard in their place. I stopped to say hi to Rex then moved further into the apartment.

"Steph?" I called out, surprised when I didn't immediately get a response. I took a few more steps inside when I felt an impact on my chest and looked down to see bright pink paint all over me. Following the angle of the shot, as well as Steph's giggles, I looked up to one of my perches that was built into the two story apartment's vaulted living room. Steph had both hands over her mouth and was impishly smiling down at me. When Tony pointed at me and laughed though, Steph picked the gun back up and shot at him, hitting him in the belly. Sam and Bruce followed suit, laughing and getting hit with a paintball each leaving only Steve, Natasha, Bucky, and Steph clean. Steve looked to be struggling the most, but he managed, just barely, to maintain his serious expression.

Walking forward with my hands raised I stood under the perch, "how'd you get up there?" In response, there was the thunk of a grappling hook at my feet. "Very resourceful."

"Yeah, I didn't think it all the way through though."

I sighed, "how bad's the wall?" I received a way too innocent smile in return, "and I haven't even left you alone with Natasha yet. Also, I thought you weren't a good shot?"

"I never said that. I said I don't _like_ guns. My actual accuracy can vary greatly based on the situation. I once shot a guy five times through the heart, and I also shot a snake that was moving through the head."

"But you also missed a guy's foot when he was running at you with a knife?"

"Like I said, highly variable."

"What did the snake do to you?" asked Bruce.

Steph wrinkled her nose and made a face saying, "someone left it and several of its buddies in a bag on my apartment door, so I guess, basically, it scared the crap out of me."

Unable to contain myself any longer, I took a run at the wall, jumped, and used it to propel myself upwards. Catching the end of the perch, I swung myself up, settling in next to Steph with my feet dangling down and an arm around her shoulder.

"Well aren't they adorable," Bucky said. "A pair of birds in a nest."

"I'm not a bird," Steph responded.

"You've been letting Natasha call you a little swallow for a week now."

"That's what that means? I wondered," Steph said.

"Why didn't you just ask, Lastochka?" Natasha asked curiously.

"I don't really care what you call me; almost everyone has a nickname for me. And I could tell it was a term of affection, so I figured it was fine."

Nudging Steph gently with my elbow, I asked, "so, how were you planning to get down?"

"If you weren't back yet, and I needed to get down, I was going to use the hook. Once you were back, I figured you'd catch me."

I went still, momentarily floored by the amount of trust in that statement. Sure, the fall wasn't enough to kill her if I didn't catch her, but it would hurt and possibly break something. The fact that she was willing to trust me so much so soon allowed that hint of what I knew would become love to solidify just a little bit more. I pulled her close with the arm around her to press a kiss on her forehead.

"Well then," I said, ignoring the crack in my voice. I jumped carefully down into a slight roll before walking back over to the perch. "Ready when you are, Gorgeous."

I easily caught her and settled her onto her feet before stealing a much more thorough kiss. When I heard throat clearing behind us, I sighed and pulled back. "Relax, Cap. We're married! I can do anything I want with this one, which is more I can say for you and Tasha. But alright, let's get this show on the road."

My eyes met Natasha's and hers promised me that I was going to pay for that comment, so I just gave her a challenging grin. I was always up for a game.


	9. Meeting The Last Soulmates

**Chapter 9 - Meeting The Last Soulmates**

_**Steph's POV**_

I'd been a little nervous about the entire team joining us on the tour because as much as I had gotten along with everyone, they were still new to me. Even Clint, who was my husband, was mostly a stranger. We'd taken a chance, and I'd yet to regret it for a moment. So, despite the nerves, I decided to take every minute I could with these people and use it to try to get to know them better. Whenever we weren't having a serious discussion, I could still learn about their individual personality and senses of humor.

Obviously I'd known from a young age that I had a lot of soulmates. More than most everyone I met, but what I'd never counted on was them all knowing each other and meeting them all at once. I was more than a little afraid that I'd inadvertently show favoritism between them and drive them away, but so far I hadn't seen a single trace of jealousy on any of their faces at any point in time.

The Tower was quite complex, in addition to its ostentatiousness. First of all, not only was it close to one hundred stories tall, but it had several dozen floors _below_ ground level as well. So, needless to say, the tour was taking a long while to complete. It was true that I didn't have access to all of the floors, but it also seemed as though I probably had the most access of anyone who wasn't an Avenger or Pepper. I would have expected to have some kind of trial period before they gave me that level of unfettered access, but apparently I was one person they were all willing to trust.

I think it was that trust that put me the most at ease about my situation and the newness of the people by whom I found myself surrounded. Surely if they could trust me and support me so unconditionally, I could do so as well. And, if I was honest with myself, I was more than half in love with Clint already. It was probably just a matter of time before I would be able to admit it to myself.

Walking up next to me, Natasha whispered, "Clint feels the same way; just be patient with him. It will probably be awhile before he says it. When you've had the training we've had, it's hard to let anyone in. But the team has gotten to know him pretty well, and we can tell. He's already much more open and happy than before he met you, if you'll believe that."

I sighed. It seemed I'd run into yet another person with freaky ESP abilities. How was this my life?

"We don't have ESP, Steph," Bucky said. And I really hoped I'd said that out loud otherwise he was totally disproving his point. "You did. But the point I'm trying to make is that even if you hadn't said that out loud, we would have known what you were thinking without ESP because your face is outrageously expressive."

I rolled my eyes, and blurted out, "your face is outrageous."

Bucky laughed and moved forward to start tickling me. Prior to that, I never would have thought The Winter Soldier was a tickler. I squirmed while laughing and trying to get away. I was only squirming halfheartedly because, while I did want to get away, I knew my best chance was to also trying to get him to drop his guard and consider me a non-threat. Once I felt he'd relaxed enough, I elbowed him in the solar plexus and scooted free while he tried to catch his breath dodging behind Clint and holding him in front of me like a shield.

"Someone's feeling playful," Tony said. "Shall we-"

Before he could finish whatever he was going to say, JARVIS cut in. "Pardon the interruption, but it appears that Mr. Odinson has arrived with a guest. He is loudly lamenting missing Mr. Barton's nuptials and celebrating a most glorious union."

Immediately we all moved to the elevator and it opened up for us as soon as we reached it.

"Why does JARVIS sound funny? And who is Mr. Odinson?" I whispered to Clint.

"Thor. And JARVIS sounds funny because he's quoting Thor," Clint said back. "You okay with meeting him and whoever his visitor is?"

"Is he going to throw his hammer at me or hit me with lightning?"

"Almost certainly not."

"Then sure, why not? He's the last teammate anyway, though I do feel a little bad for being everyone else's platonic and not his."

As the elevator door opened, Clint said, "apparently our system of words is not how it works with Asgardians, so you never know."

While we'd been riding in the elevator, Clint and Natasha had shuffled me to the front of the group. Before I could ask how it worked with Asgardians, the doors opened, and something that felt almost like a giant magnetic pull hit me in both arms at once. With wide eyes, I tried to dig my heels in as I resisted, throwing a panicked look over my shoulder. Everyone else seemed completely unconcerned about the situation, and Clint even gave me a reassuring smile.

In front of me was a man who was dressed in full battle armor. Even without his hammer, I would have been hard pressed not to know he was Thor because I'd seen his pictures but also because of the sheer power his presence seemed to radiate. Next to him was a woman dressed in what seemed to be a similar style of armor. Then again, I was in no way an armor expert, so they could be radically different and I wouldn't know. I mean, as far as I was concerned, armor is armor. On her back was a sword and shield, so I figured she was a god as well, or possibly a guard of some sort. In unison, their arms shot out, and both broke into wide smiles moments before my arms, completely of their own volition, clamped onto theirs.

"A sister of the soul! How lucky we are," Thor boomed out. "I am Thor Odinson, and this is Lady Sif."

I was still trying to figure out what had happened and hadn't managed to respond when Clint came up behind me and slid a comforting arm around my waist. "Thor, Sif, allow me to introduce you to my wife, Stephanie."

As soon as my name was said, I felt whatever was holding our arms together release, and we slowly let go of each other. "It is an honor to meet you, Lady Barton."

There was a moment of awkwardness at that, and I felt Clint's arm tighten around my waist before I shrugged and instead of correcting Thor said, "it's a pleasure to meet you both as well, though would you mind telling me what that was?" I gestured helplessly at their arms and pantomimed the hold we'd had on each other.

Sif laughed and said, "You are a sister of the soul to both of us. I believe the term you on Midgard would use is 'platonic soulmate'."

I twisted my neck around so I could look at Clint who was smiling down at me, "so that's what you meant. You know, you could have warned me. I take comfort only in the fact that you and almost all of the guys owe Natasha some amount of money now."

"Steph, why would that make you happy? My money is your money too now," Clint replied.

With a smile I responded, "sure, but in some things, us ladies have to stick together." I held my fist out in Natasha's direction, satisfied when she bumped it with hers.

I was pleasantly surprised with Sif responded, "verily!" and held her hand out for a fist bump as well.

"I now find myself even more pleased to say that we brought with us a feast worthy of a celebration," Thor boomed, holding his hand out to the side.

As one, the group of us turned our heads in the direction he indicated, gasping in surprise at the tables that had not been there before and were heavily laden with massive amounts of food and what I assumed to be barrels of some sort of beer.

"How did you?" Tony squeaked out. "On the bridge?"

"We had assistance from Heimdall, as well as a few workers who have already been returned to Asgard." Sif said. "Heimdall is also the one who relayed Lady Natasha's request for me to join Thor on this journey. Lady Natasha, you have my thanks for joining me with my soul sister, though how you knew, I know not." Sif put a fist to her heart and bowed her head, a gesture which Natasha solemnly returned.

Without any further ado, Clint and I found ourselves rushed over to the delicious buffet where we loaded up our plates. We sat together in one of the armchairs, piled together in a manner that somehow managed to not be at all awkward. I was draped across Clint's lap, and we ate contentedly. For the most part, I stayed quieter than usual, content to watch everyone interact and try to fit the puzzle pieces of their identities together. Once we finished eating, Clint and I got back up and took our plates to the kitchen.

Looking behind him to make sure no one was paying us any attention, Clint slid his arms around me to cushion me before pushing me with his body up against the cabinets behind me. I felt a caress of tenderness in my mind before Clint fit his lips against mine, quickly slipping his tongue into my mouth. When he pulled his head up, I was feeling more than a little fuzzy. "What was that for?"

"I wanted to," Clint murmured "because I really, really like you."

"Mmmmm, I really, really like you too," I responded with a smile.

"About what Thor said earlier..." he'd taken on an extremely cautious tone and looked more hesitant than I'd ever seen him.

I could also feel the nerves rolling off of him, so I quickly gathered what he was referencing. "Ah," I said, giving him another kiss. "Lady Barton?"

Clint wrapped one of his hands around my neck as he pushed himself more firmly into me again, "you didn't correct him… do you want to be Lady Barton?"

"Well, I think we would need to be in Great Britain and you would need to be a Lord for that to come into play," I teased.

"Actually, we were all given honorary titles after the Battle of New York, but that's beside the point. You know what I mean," Clint said with more than a touch of exasperation.

"Do you want me to be?"

"Do you want to be?"

"You guys are the worst!" Natasha yelled.

"Hey, butt out!" Clint yelled back.

"You know she's the Black Widow, right?" I whispered urgently.

"Oh please, she's a kitten." After a few beats of silence, Clint whispered, "is she behind me? I feel like she heard me. I'm too young to die."

"I'm sure she heard you, but you're not dead yet, so that's probably a good sign."

"Only because of you, Lastochka," Natasha murmured from close enough to have Clint actually jump a little. "He may live longer if he says what he feels right now."

Clint gave a long suffering sigh, refusing to look anywhere but at me as he said, "yes, I would like that."

With a smile I hoped was reassuring, I replied, "me too."

Before I could pull Clint to me for another kiss, Natasha grabbed me by the arm and was dragging me away from Clint as she said, "Good, that's settled. JARVIS will have the paperwork ready for you to sign by tomorrow."

"Yes, Ms. Romanov," came the instant and serious response.

"Where are we going?" I asked. "Because I was kinda in the middle of something…"

"You two can, and I'm sure will, do that later, Lastochka. Right now we are celebrating."

I pouted a little as Natasha guided me back out to the rest of the group, but was mollified by the glass of beer I was handed and the fact that I got to settle back onto Clint's lap.

"The Captain was just informing us that you were wed on the same day you met," Sif inquired.

"That's right," I said a little nervously because I imagined it was a strange concept for many people, but especially for aliens who lived to be thousands of years old and likely saw no reason to rush relationships like we had.

"Do not look at me so; I do not judge you for this decision. In fact, I think it is brilliant. It is true that Asgardians live quite long, but those who are warriors learn quickly to accept that there are tides in the universe that you cannot swim against*. I for one commend you for embracing this fact."

I smiled shyly at Sif and at Thor who was nodding enthusiastically. "It is true what Lady Sif says," Thor agreed. "And I have witnessed many a mate perish from the realms of the living without being so fortunate as to meet. I must apologize again for being unavailable when you returned, but I was summoned back to Asgard on urgent business. I was leaving as our Captain returned for Bruce saying you needed medical assistance. What ailed you?"

I explained what had happened with the children and my car, a little taken aback by the huge smile on Thor's face while I told the story. Call me crazy, but I didn't think my platonic soulmate would be so happy to hear about me being hurt.

"You risked yourself to save a child- how well suited you are for all of us!" he cried out, and with that, his happiness made sense to me.

After spending my entire life feeling like I didn't fit in with my family or The Burg as a whole, a feeling that had only escalated over the past couple of years since I had become a bounty hunter, I looked around the room and realized that maybe this was where I could truly belong. This crazy group of people seemed to wholeheartedly embrace me for who I was, and I wasn't used to it, but I knew one day I could be.

**A/N:** *It's a line of Sif's from an episode of Marvel's Agents of SHIELD, and I love it, so I'm borrowing it right along with all these characters! :)


	10. Words from the Past

**Chapter 10 - Words from the Past**

_**Steph's POV**_

For the first two weeks of living in The Tower, I'd flat out refused to sign a contract and take a job with the Avengers because in my mind the offer was the world's worst case of nepotism. Plus, like Clint said, we didn't need the money, and I was perfectly willing to help the team without getting paid to do so. They were all so important to me and becoming more so by the day, so of course I wanted them to be as safe as possible when they worked. Because they were such a small operation with SHIELD gone, no one had really filled out many of their recent files once the cases were resolved. That left a lot of gaps, especially with things like known associates, for me to fill in just in case something more happened down the road.

After the first week of helping the team out, a large chunk of money was deposited in my account, causing the bank to call me to verify that it wasn't an accident and that I actually knew Tony Stark. How embarrassing is it that after the last couple years, my bank was so used to me not having money, that they had to call and make sure everything was okay when I did. When the exact same amount of money hit my bank the next Friday, I had a feeling I knew what was going on.

"Tony!" I hollered when I walked into the common floor at dinnertime. "I don't need an allowance!"

"Well, since you won't sign a contract, Stark Industries can't pay you officially. So I had to find a way to unofficially pay you."

Steve's head whipped around, "we're not paying you?"

Everyone looked surprised except for Clint because he and I had already had the conversation. And Pepper, of course, since she had been the one continually trying to get me to sign the contract. Clint leaned back in his chair, a smile on his face, clearly waiting for the show. I knew he legitimately didn't care one way or the other, but he'd warned me that this exact argument would happen at some point and that it probably wouldn't go my way.

"Why would you pay me for helping you?"

"Because you're working with us?" Steve asked, clearly not understanding.

I snorted and rolled my eyes at the same time, a feat I was proud of myself for accomplishing but one that Steve didn't really enjoy. "And I know exactly why I got the job."

"Because you're good at it," Bucky replied steadily.

"No because I'm everyone's soulmate."

"What you do is very important to our safety, Lastochka. We wouldn't let anyone do it who wasn't qualified and capable," Natasha reasoned.

We'd gone a few more rounds, which included me saying some things about my supposed skills that made everyone angry and Bruce more than a little green before I'd given up and signed the contract Pepper had put in front of me. After that, the paychecks kept coming, but from a more official source, and were accompanied by the most generous benefits package I'd ever seen.

The job had also come with an extremely flexible schedule and a "work whenever and how much you feel like it" clause that I appreciated a lot because that had been what I liked the most about bounty hunting. Although I had an office, I could work from almost anywhere in the Tower, especially as I got to know JARVIS better and was given a whole host of proprietary tech Stark had created, tablet included. That meant that most days, I worked from our apartment, the common floor, Tony or Bruce's labs, the gym, or really anywhere someone from the team was who didn't mind company at the moment.

I'd been pleasantly surprised by my friendship with Pepper because I'd assumed there would be weirdness with her _not_ being my soulmate. Pepper, however, was very nice about it, even admitting one day that she felt kind of bad for me to have such a crazy bunch attached to me. Because I was more than a little crazy myself, I figured it made sense. Still, I enjoyed the time I spent with Pepper because it came with less pressure and more normalcy.

Some days, when we both could manage, we'd sneak out for a long lunch and do some shopping around town. Those days were some of my favorites because, well, I loved shopping. Whenever we went out, we took Happy Hogan, a man who it seemed had been head of security, before Stark Industries went global with that particular branch, but was perfectly content providing security for Pepper now. Sometimes I felt a burn or a slight tingle on the back of my neck that made me think Clint or someone on the team was out there watching over us as well, but it wasn't every time and I chose to let it go. I'd been working on my self defense moves with everyone on the team, but they'd also filled me with enough horror stories about their enemies that I was willing to let them fuss.

On one particular Monday, things had been extra frustrating, so Pepper and I decided to go out. Sometimes we shopped high end boutiques, but that day we were walking in some of the more touristy areas when a couple of men dressed way down caught my eye. I turned to get a better look, but when I blinked they were gone.

"Steph?" I could hear Pepper in the corner of my mind as I stared at the spot the men had been, "are you feeling alright. You look pale and like you're going to pass out or something."

Shaking myself both mentally and physically, I turned to Pepper and pasted on a smile, "yeah, I'm fine. Sorry, I thought I saw… but there's no way. Just my imagination. Sorry about that. Hey, would you mind if I headed back early? You can keep Happy with you, I'll just hail a cab."

I walked to the street and stuck my arm out, satisfied when a cab stopped immediately. Without waiting for a response from Pepper or Happy, I climbed in and told the driver to take me to Avengers Tower. Not more than a few minutes later, I was walking into the lobby, waving at the security guards as I made my way to the back, private elevator. It started moving as soon as I stepped in without JARVIS saying a word, but I didn't think too much of it until he opened the door and I found myself facing down the entire team and Pepper.

"What the _hell_ were you thinking? Do you have any idea how worried I was? Are you okay?" Pepper screamed.

"How did you even get back here before me?"

"Happy drives fast when he's motivated."

"Huh, good to know."

I walked past everyone into the kitchen and poked around until I found some doughnuts and grabbed a couple with a glass of milk.

"Steph, what happened? Pepper said you were scared, and I could feel you." Clint said squatting down next to me when I sat to eat my doughnuts.

"Honestly, it was nothing. I thought I saw someone I knew, and I was surprised. It threw me off; that's all. I'm sorry I worried you, Pepper. I swear, I'm fine."

No one quite looked like they believed me, but it was Natasha who finally said, "Fine, Lastochka. But you should be able to trust us by now."

If I didn't know any better, I'd think she was hurt. "Look, Nat, it's just something that's over and done and I really don't like talking about. And there's no way it was who I thought it was; it was just my mind playing mean tricks on me."

"Are you sure?" Bucky asked, arm whirring menacingly.

"I'll run a check later just to verify if it would make you happy, but yes, I'm sure. And it isn't a matter of trust. I know all of you have things in your pasts you'd rather not talk about, and I respect that. Please respect this."

There were soft murmurs of assent around the room, and everyone backed off a little after that. Though none of them seemed willing to let me out of their sight for the rest of the day, so I worked on my tablet from the common room for a few more hours before giving up and starting a game of Cards Against Humanity with everyone. I'd kept them stashed away for just the right moment, and this seemed like a good time. Plus, the looks on Steve's face and the way he blushed when someone, usually Natasha, would explain some of the cards to him were even better than I'd had any right to hope they would be.

For the next couple of days, life went back to normal. I stayed in for the most part, but that wasn't abnormal for weekdays anyway. If I took my training a little extra seriously, no one seemed to mind, though I think they all correctly figured out that it was related. Thursday morning, when I went to breakfast, no one was there. I asked JARVIS, and he said they were in the War Room, but they weren't Assembling, so I could join them if I wanted. Grabbing a whole wheat bagel and some orange juice, I started munching as I stepped in the elevator. Because I was hungry, I'd managed to polish off the whole thing before I stepped out into the room. Seeing everyone gathered in front of some screens, I wandered over, sliding an arm around Clint's waist as I did so. I heard someone say something about kitties and was kind of excited for half a moment.

"Hey guys, what's…" I trailed off as I took in the images in front of me. Starting to shake, I got out, "is that here? That's the Tower, isn't it. How? No, seriously, what the fuck?"

Everyone immediately turned to watch as Clint lowered me into a chair. Suddenly I knew I was going to be sick, and I looked around in panic grateful when Natasha shoved a trash can in front of me. I promptly lost my breakfast then hyperventilated until Clint took the can, pressed my head between my knees, and rubbed a hand on my back while whispering reassurances in my ear.

"That's what I get for eating a healthy breakfast," I muttered, causing Sam to laugh and everyone else to look at him incredulously. I gave him a smile of thanks and he nodded. "JARVIS, I need Ranger on the phone like yesterday. If he's not available, Tank will do, but I'm really hoping Ranger isn't in the wind right now."

I felt Clint bristle a little, so I ran a soothing hand down his arm and whispered, "he has contacts in Trenton and people who can be on the streets where we'll need them within moments. People who can go places and blend in where none of us easily can."

JARVIS connected the audio to the room. "Yo," I let out a small sigh of relief.

"Hey, Ranger."

"What's up, Babe?"

"Anton Ward and Eugene Brown, heard anything about them getting out of jail early?"

Tony and Natasha moved over to interface consoles and started working with JARVIS to pull whatever information they could find.

I heard a muffled curse and some talking in the background, and assumed Ranger had his hand over the phone. When he came back he said, "Tank's on the phone with Corrections and Hector's on the street. I really don't want to know, but why are you asking?"

"I thought I saw them when I was out Monday, but since they're supposed to have another 10-15 years each in maximum security, I assumed I was imagining things. But now I'm staring at graffiti on the side of Avengers Tower. Kitty paws with the letters 'CSS' and 'GKC'. Seriously, how is this happening again? I thought they'd all been scared off and this was over."

My eyes were a little unfocused as I saw pictures of the two men in question go up on the blank wall to the right of the pictures of the Tower. Following the pictures were newspaper clippings and crime scene photos. There were pictures of me with the hell beat out of me and my clothing pretty much ripped off me that I didn't even remember anyone from the police department taking. I had a hand over my mouth and had curled into myself a little, rocking in my chair. I could hear talking going on around me, but it was all just an unintelligible roar in my ears.

Clint knelt on the ground in front of me, pulled my hands away from my mouth and stomach and held them with a firm grip until I looked up at him.

"Steph, you're okay. I'm here." I heard Natasha clear her throat and Clint corrected himself, "we're here and we're not going to let anything happen to you. But right now, we really need you to focus, okay?"

Taking a steadying breath, I nodded my head slowly. "Yeah, okay."

Steve held out a handkerchief, and Clint grabbed it and wiped the tears I hadn't even realized I'd been crying off my face.

"Babe?" I heard Ranger's voice and I rolled my shoulders back.

"I'm here, Ranger."

"Looks like the Slayers' lawyer was able to push through some ridiculous appeals on some of the charges. And I've got a court transcript here where Ward tries to bring you down for kidnapping, but don't worry, that went nowhere. They don't have any proof and no one believes him. Anyway, their sentences were reduced and, you're not going to believe this, but they were released early for good behavior."

"Kidnapping?" Natasha asked, her lips quirked on one side.

"Okay, it went like this. Anton Ward was going around and robbing places, dressed in a Red Devil mask. One day, completely by my freakin' bad luck, I came across him as he was coming out from one of his robberies and caught a glimpse of him without his mask on. While I was trying to figure out who he was so I could ID him for the cops, I rode into the territory of a local gang, the Comstock Street Slayers, in a powder blue car. That was a bad move because it was the color of their rivals, and they didn't like it. Eugene Brown was there and when they started threatening Lula and I with guns, rape, you know, the works, I sped off with Eugene on the hood of my car. He flew off a few blocks later and took the whole thing very personally.

"Because I could ID Ward, had pissed off Eugene, and had brought in several Slayers in my time as a bounty hunter and it's 'not good to get collected by snatch', I got put on the gang's hit list when a new leader got sent over from LA for them and he needed to impress the bangers before he could take over power. While we were trying to figure out who this guy, Junkman, was and why he was after me, I captured Ward. He couldn't make bail, so I convinced Connie to bond him out on the condition that he wore a tracking bracelet. Then we staged him breaking out of our custody, and kidnapped him."

Sam had this look of sick fascination on his face as he asked, "what was the point of that?"

"We were planning to beat the information out of him."

Bucky, Natasha, and Clint were nodding along, which I expected. What took me by surprise was that Steve also seemed totally on board with the plan. Thor actually looked the most apprehensive. Everyone looked up when Ranger started full on laughing over the phone.

I sighed, "it turned out none of us _could_ beat it out of him when we tried, but thankfully Ranger got back into town that night. He went the next day and threatened the information out of Ward. I don't know if you know this, but apparently Ranger is more intimidating than me. Then we pretended that we captured Ward, revoked his bond for refusing to wear the tracker, and took him back to jail."

"Nice," Bucky said.

"Very, but also probably not the most legal thing I've done." Everyone, Thor included, kind of shrugged that off, and I guess that made sense for a group that called themselves The Avengers. Avenging wasn't about the law.

"Then Steph slipped her protective guard and got kidnapped by the Slayers," Ranger said, still sounding annoyed over the whole thing which had me wincing. It figured _that_ was what got me Steve's disappointed face, not the kidnapping.

"They took me to that playground, and Junkman beat me inside the circle until I got too close to the edge and the gang members pulled me into the crowd of them. The plan was for as many of them who wanted to rape me to do so before Junkman killed me. Eugene Brown wanted to be first, but I kicked him as hard as I could in the junk. I figured if I was going to get raped, it wasn't going to be by him." Clint's hands tightened on my knees, so I took a breath and continued. "Before they could, my friend Sally Sweet, a big cross-dressing dude, plowed into a bunch of them with the school bus he drove, and took out most of the rest with an Uzi. Unfortunately, Eugene was still on the ground from my kick, so he didn't get hit. At least the Junkman got pinned under the bus Wicked Witch style and later died from his injuries. Eugene went to jail, and I _thought_ he and Anton were still there."

"They got released two weeks ago, Babe. I have no idea how they found you or why I didn't know they were out."

"Lady Stephanie," Sif, who had remained silent thus far started. When I looked up and met her eyes, she fingered her sword and said, "they will not get to you again."

* * *

**A/N: **I will do what I can, but updates next week are somewhat questionable as I'll be traveling.


	11. The Past Comes Back to Haunt

**Chapter 11 - The Past Comes Back to Haunt**

_**Tony's POV**_

After Steph told her story, the team separated to complete various objectives. Clint, Sam, Thor, Sif and Steve took Steph to the gym to work on her hand to hand and hopefully calm her down a little. Natasha and I went into research mode with Bucky and Bruce standing there watching us.

"Bruce, I know this isn't really your cup of tea," I said.

"What do you need?"

"There's a list of known associates we've pulled so far waiting for you, I want you to go to the side room over there so you can use verbal commands without bothering us. Work with JARVIS on these. Start with just finding out who is alive, dead, in jail, or well, you know. I figure you spent enough time on the run and off the grid to be able to pick some stuff up from these searches," Bruce nodded in agreement and walked out.

Natasha and I kept working with Bucky silently observing. He'd pace behind us both, reading off our screens not saying anything. Finally, he nodded his head and started to walk out of the room. "Barnes, are you sure you can do this without being recognized?" He stopped and looked at me solemnly then nodded. Before he could turn around again, I said, "JARVIS, open Bolt Supply Barnes-4."

A panel opened in the wall and I gestured Bucky over, and stopped paying attention. In the cubby he'd find alternate ID, untraceable weapons, and a bunch of money in small, non-sequential bills all of which should be suitable for this particular type of work.

"Bribe whoever the hell you need to, there's more where that came from," I commented as he walked out the door. Once he was in the elevator and gone, I looked over at Natasha. "Think he'll find anything?"

"Absolutely, but how much is really the question. Gangs are notoriously internally loyal, but this is the type of thing they're going to want to hype up and brag about."

"Especially with the Avengers involved."

Natasha grunted in response and I pondered that for a while before I said, "how dumb do you have to be?"

"You think it's not just the gang? Not just about Steph? It's possible."

"Possible, but doesn't make a lot of sense the other way either."

"There's at least a dozen ways I think this could be coming at us, Stark, and none of them make any more sense than the others. Unless and until we find anything indicating otherwise, the most likely answer is the simplest. They're so pissed at Steph, they're willing to take the stupid risk on the hope of getting lucky and taking her out."

I hummed noncommittally, "JARVIS, get Rangeman on the phone for me again."

"Yo."

"It's Tony Stark," I said.

"We're kind of busy here, Stark."

"I know, and I'm not going to keep you. But if you or any of your team want to come work from here for however long this takes, feel free. I figure we should share info and that would make it easier. No point in doing all the same research twice. Plus, with Steph here, the action will be here."

"Roger that," he responded hanging up the phone.

"Did he just hang up on me? People don't hang up on me."

"Apparently at least one person does," Natasha responded dryly. "And you know I would given the chance."

Two hours later, I had a lunch buffet spread out all along the conference room table as the gym rats came back.

"Hey Sweetie Pie," I greeted Steph.

I couldn't hold back the laugh when she fired back, "Hey Plucky."

"He's got a mansion and a sweet side, so I'll take it." With a smile, I added, "Bucky is so Furrball."

Steph snorted out a laugh, and I saw Clint give me a nod of gratitude. I knew we'd all be playing a game of trying to keep Steph in good spirits until this thing was resolved, and right now it was my turn. "I have to admit," Steph said, "I wouldn't have pegged you for a cartoon fan."

"Anything on a hungover Saturday or Sunday morning," I said amused by the grunts of agreement I got from everyone but Cap.

Looking around, Steve finally asked, "where's Buck?"

"On the streets," Natasha said calmly. When Steph started to protest, Clint ran a soothing hand down her arm and Natasha continued, "don't worry about it Steph. The man's a ghost. A shadow. No one is going to see him unless he wants to be seen. And he's damn good at profiling on the fly, so he won't screw up choosing who gets to see him."

Pepper had escorted a contingent from Rangeman right behind Steph and the team, and I watched curiously as Steph looked at Ranger guiltily and asked, "he won't, ah… right?"

I turned my full attention to her as Steve filled in the blank, "kill them if he finds them."

Steph glanced back at Ranger, who stiffened up when he noticed that everyone in the room took in the movement. Natasha made a tsking sound, "more secrets, Lastochka? You continue to be more fascinating by the day. No, Barnes probably won't kill anyone today. He'll want to investigate and make sure we've all identified the entire threat before anyone gets eliminated."

"Not to mention the fact that he'll see you, Steph, as having first rights of refusal on that. Followed Barton," Sam said calmly.

Ranger had a surprised look on his face, and Steph just leaned over and whispered something about the word "avenge." I didn't hear exactly what she said, but I could fill in the blanks and knew it was correct.

Softly, and knowing exactly what he was giving away, Ranger confidently said, "Eddie Abruzzi's death was ruled a suicide."

I could see all the other Avengers mentally file away the name for investigation later, but even knowing as little about Ranger as I did, I was pretty sure whoever that Abruzzi guy was, he _hadn't_ committed suicide. In a way I think it was Ranger's way of telling us all where he stood on the issue of Steph's safety while still offering us all plausible deniability. We were much more public figures, so he no doubt thought he could protect us all from backlash if he was the one to take the men down.

Fuck that noise. Steph was my family now, and if I got there first, my plan was to attack, consequences be damned. I had a team of lawyers that would happily earn millions of dollars in my defense if need be.

Still, I knew what it was to feel like the world was going crazy around you and the importance of retaining at least some sort of semblance of control. With that in mind, I very clearly turned so I was addressing Steph and asked, "so, what's the plan? You and Hawkeye going to lock yourselves away in a nest somewhere and make an eyas or two?"

Steph looked confused, until Barton whispered something to her, then she managed to simultaneously laugh and blush bright red.

"Not that is is any of your business, Stark." Barton said firmly, "but that isn't anywhere in the plans, probably forever, but at least for the time being." The look he shot me told me that he appreciated that I was keeping Steph laughing, but that particular joke was taboo until further notice.

Steph shrugged it off and gestured at the screens around the room displaying information on Anton Ward, Eugene Brown, and their closest known associates.

"Did you find anything particularly concerning on a level beyond vandalism yet?"

"No, not yet," I responded for those of us doing the research.

"Do you have any video of the vandalism happening, and can we ID them on it?"

"Video yes; ID, no."

Ranger looked like he was going to argue with him, but Steve and Clint both raised their hand to cut him off before he started while studying Steph carefully.

"Okay, then for all we know, it isn't actually those two. Or they don't want to take you all on, so they're just having some fun messing with me. Nothing they painted is a direct threat. Hector's on the street in Trenton, and apparently Bucky is out here. We keep an ear to the ground for word of vengeance or, heaven forbid, another hit being put out on me. I don't go out alone, or ditch the people I'm out with again." She flashed Pepper an apologetic smile, and Pepper just returned one that said Steph was forgiven. "Otherwise, we just go on with our day to day lives. I'm not going to let them make me cower. If we get a specific threat, we regroup then. In the meantime, I'll run some more thorough searches on them on the side and monitor them continuously for alarming behavior."

We all looked around the room at each other and slowly nodded. Ranger seemed the most hesitant, and looked like he was going to insist on locking her up before finally nodding reluctantly.

I noticed Steph kept looking at me like she wanted to ask something, so I finally gently asked, "what?"

"Clint, uh, mentioned that he has a tracker that you implanted in him. It stays off, but if he were to drop off the grid unexpectedly, you could find him."

I eyed Clint speculatively and he shrugged his shoulders saying he hadn't pushed her. So I answered and said, "yes, that's true."

"Do you have an extra that you might be willing to use on me?"

"They're not temporary, Steph," I cautioned. "It's not something you just put in and take out whenever you want. If you decide you don't want it anymore, we can remove it, but it'll be a procedure."

"I know, and if you don't have one or you don't want to, that's fine. I just figured you already told me about the types of people who are after you all anyway, and might use me to try to get you. I thought it might be something that would make _everyone_ more comfortable and I'm fine with it as long as you promise not to track it unless you need to. But, I mean, it's really no big deal. Forget I asked."

"That's not what he's saying. He just wants to make sure you understand and are giving informed consent, especially since you haven't known us all that long yet. I for one would _like_ knowing we had one of those units in you, and I'm sure the others would too," Bruce reassured her.

Steph looked around and everyone reassured her that they would appreciate it, but that it needed to be her choice. Finally she looked back at me and I just waited patiently. "If you have one, I think _I_ would be more comfortable with that as well," she finally said.

"No rant about civil liberties, and personal freedom, Babe?" Ranger asked in a tone that I couldn't tell whether it was joking or not.

Steph spun and pointed an accusatory finger at him, "did you hear a single person here threaten to lock me in a bathroom or stun gun me if I tried to leave? No! Because I'm a grown damn woman and I can make my own choices."

"There was a hit out on you, Steph! All I wanted you to do was stay inside where it was safe!"

"With nothing to do and no end date in sight! You'd have been happy to have me locked inside Haywood for the rest of my life if it meant keeping me safe! My sister was getting married, and I had to go to her shower, Ranger. You were being unreasonable."

"I was being unreasonable?! All I did was ask you to stay inside and not go crazy so I could make sure it was safe for you to go out without getting dead!"

"I thought they had him. And, by the way, ordering your men to stun gun me if I tried to leave is not legal!"

They continued to rail at each other for several minutes, as this was apparently an argument they'd had several times over the years. On one hand, I couldn't begrudge Ranger trying to keep Steph safe, but on the other, I'd learned over years not to tell strong-willed women to do anything. Or to make ultimatums with them. Generally speaking, it just pissed them off and came back to haunt you at the oddest times.

Once they'd finally quieted down, there were a few moments of silence before Natasha finally said, "well, that was informative."

"Right, well. If we're done with that," I said, eyeing Steph and Ranger and receiving curt nods in response, "then I have that other present we talked about ready." I directed the last to Clint who looked excited and relieved at the information.

"I called in a favor, and was able to get the specs for this and the ammo for Stark to produce something for you, Steph," Clint explained. We all crowded onto the elevator, and took it down to one of my workshop floors. "You don't like carrying your gun when you're out because if you pull it, you have to be willing to use it, and you really aren't," he said it like a statement, not a question, but Steph agreed anyway.

"This," I said, whipping a cloth that was covering up the contents of a table off with flourish, "is called an I.C.E.R., which stands for Incapacitating Cartridge Emitting Railgun. It is something a friend developed, and I've only made just a couple of slight modifications for you. Like custom sizing it to your hand."

Excitedly, Clint cut in, "he's also adapted the rounds to develop things that make sense for the rest of us as well, even for my arrows. At any rate, shoot someone with one of those, and it'll incapacitate them rather than kill them. They'll wake up a couple hours later good as new."

"Really?" Steph asked, picking one of the handguns up and looking at it carefully. "You've tested this?"

"Yep," I said with a grin. "Got more rounds for you down in the armory next to the shooting range. Figured you'd want to practice with it to get comfortable."

Clint added, "Our friends have successfully used them in combat, and I made Stark test one on me."

She released the magazine and verified that they were ICER rounds before slamming them back in and firing on Ranger. He sank to the ground unconscious and Steph shrugged when Clint looked at her incredulously. "I feel better now," she said as stepped over Ranger and walked toward the elevator with her new gun grumbling about overbearing men trying to tell her what to do.

Sam let out a low whistle and followed her, while Bruce hastily explained to her that although Ranger would be just fine, she really shouldn't make a habit out of doing that to people unless she needed to. Especially the same people over and over. I looked between Natasha and Clint before the latter laughed and the former said, "well, at least she's not afraid of it," and the two rushed off after her.

As the elevator door shut, I turned to Ranger's men who were staring at me and then down at their boss. "Well, one of you put him on the couch so he'll at least be a little more comfortable when he wakes up. You can either go back upstairs and work, go to the shooting range where I'm assuming Steph went, or stay here with him. I'm going to stay here and work on some things. JARVIS will monitor Ranger to make sure he doesn't have any unexpected reactions, but really, he'll be fine."

Tank hauled Ranger up and set him on the couch indicated then they spread themselves out among various seats in the room. I was unsurprised because I figured they wouldn't willingly leave him behind while he was helpless. Watching them out of the corner of my eye, I asked, "out of curiosity, did any of you actually threaten her with a stun gun if she left?"

Hal nervously raised his hand and I just looked at him incredulously. "Were you going to use it? What'd she do?"

"Yes, Ranger ordered me to, but I let her look at it first and she stunned me with it."

I started laughing, unable to control myself for several minutes while the others joined in and promised to send me the video of the incident. Hal was looking down at his feet, but looked up eventually and met my eyes when I finally stopped laughing to catch my breath. I pointed at him and said, "you, my friend, are lucky she didn't shoot you too."


	12. Emotions Revealed

**Chapter 12 - Emotions Revealed**

_**Clint's POV**_

Riding in the elevator down to the shooting range with Steph after she shot Ranger with the ICER, I was having the hardest time maintaining a straight face while Bruce lectured her on why it wasn't a good idea for her to make a habit of doing so. Although Bruce had a point, I for one couldn't help but be relieved by the increased comfort level with this new weapon that her actions showed.

"So, do you like it?" I asked eagerly once Bruce finally finished his lecture. "Will you agree to carry it with you at all times?"

Steph gave me a goofy smile and a big kiss before responding, "yes, very much. And define 'at all times' for me, please? Do I have to wear it in the Tower?"

I sighed, "you don't have to do anything, Steph. But I would feel more comfortable if you wore this anytime you were anywhere other than our apartment in the Tower, yes."

Seeing the beginning of a protest forming, Natasha quickly injected, "or on the common floor when we're all home provided you can show me that you know where the weapons are. But Clint's right, the Tower is targeted somewhat regularly, and it would be best if you were prepared if and when that happened."

"Does Pepper walk around armed?"

It was Bruce who chose to respond carefully, "when Pepper leaves the building, she has an armed guard because she can't fight like you can. When she's in the Tower, JARVIS and Tony have ways of protecting her."

"Very interesting," Steph said slowly. "Well, you all will have to help me remember, but sure. I can do that."

"On your person," Natasha clarified, "not inside your purse full of crap. You need to be able to pull it quickly, and have extra rounds accessible as well."

"I look ridiculous with a gun holstered to me," Steph complained.

Natasha rolled her eyes, and looked to be about to say something to Steph when the elevator doors opened. I unceremoniously shoved everyone out of the elevator, Natasha first, and pushed the button to close the doors with just Steph and I inside. "JARVIS, give us a few minutes of privacy if at all possible here."

"Alright, Gorgeous, let's do this."

"We're having sex in the elevator?"

"What? No! Why would we be having sex in the elevator right now? Not that it wouldn't be fun, but I mean, everyone's out there waiting for us, and I doubt JARVIS would be willing to give us enough time," I mentally shook myself to get my mind back out of the gutter my beautiful wife had put it in, "We're going to talk through whatever this ridiculous objection to gun holsters is."

"I just told you, I look like an idiot when I wear them."

"I'm sure you don't, Steph. But maybe you feel uncomfortable with them for some other reason."

I stood there, waiting patiently, unmoving while Steph acted like she didn't know what I was talking about. Finally she blew out a breath and said, "I hated that they made me feel like Annie Oakley or something and always drew people's attention. It made them remember what my job was, and they'd start talking about how worthless I was at it. They also made Morelli mad, which usually meant he would yell about how I needed to quit my job if I had to carry a gun around."

"Didn't he carry a gun for his job?"

"Yes."

"So he was being a hypocritical jackass and the rest of the people in that damn town were being good for nothing, jealous busybodies who didn't know what they were talking about anyway." She didn't look like she believed me, but she looked like she was working on it, so I had to accept that for now. It was next to impossible to make someone believe in something by sheer force of will alone in one fell swoop. But that was fine, I was patient enough to play the long game. I tilted her face up with a hand under her chin and said, "and you're not a poser because you're actually decent about a real gun when you don't think about it. You'll be great with this one, I have no doubt, since you won't be afraid of it."

She rolled her eyes at me and mumbled something about shooting skills, and I just said, "nuh uh, don't you go comparing yourself to me in the firing range, Gorgeous. That's just not fair. That's my specialty, not yours."

"Oh yeah, what's my specialty then?" she questioned.

"Well, let's see. You have so many, how can I choose?" I used my body to bump her up against the back of the elevator. "You care about people, like really and truly actually care about them as people." When she scoffed, I added, "Steph, when you live the type of life I've lived- one full of lies and betrayal- finding someone who cares about you as a person is a miracle. No way I've done nearly enough good in my life to deserve that, to deserve you, but here you are, and I love you so much for that alone."

She pulled herself back as much as she could with her back against a wall and looked into my eyes intently with her own eyes wider than I'd ever seen them before. "You love me?"

"With everything I am."

"You just love me. No conditions, no qualifiers, you love me?"

I felt myself frown a little at the shock and uncertainty I could feel coming off our our bond, so I focused that corner of my brain on making her feel my love. "Of course I do, Steph. How could I not? You're an amazing woman, and if you're going to take me on, there's no way I'm foolish enough to put qualifiers on my love. I have no right to, it's you who should be making me jump through hoops or something to prove myself to you."

There was more I wanted to say, but Steph just put her finger on my lips before pulling herself up on to tiptoes and replacing her finger with her lips. We floated along for a few minutes wrapped around each other and sending love back and forth through the bond before Steph pulled back. She looked up at my eyes and whispered, "I love you too, Clint. Dark side, and light side. No matter what you did in the past, what you do now, or what you do down the line, you are a good man. And I'm lucky to have you _and_ your love." She gave me another brief kiss before pulling back and saying, "and if it makes you feel better, we'll find a holster and I'll wear the gun. Thank you for finding me a weapon I'm comfortable with."

Before we could get lost in each other again, JARVIS let off a polite pinging noise to let us know he'd deactivated privacy mode. We straightened up a little as the elevator doors opened again. Steph was trying to contain her hair while looking around the floor, so I just cleared my throat and held out the elastic band between two fingers that I'd pulled from her hair earlier.

"How in the world? I didn't even feel…" Steph trailed off and flushed a little when she noticed Thor, Sif, Natasha, Steve, and Sam watching in amusement. I chuckled a little, which caused Steph to narrow her eyes at me and mutter, "ass."

At that, I let out a full blown laugh before putting an arm around her waist and saying, "awww, come on, Gorgeous, you know you love me."

"And clearly I shouldn't have told you because it was too much for your ego."

"Don't worry, Lastochka. He always had the ego, it's nothing new," Natasha said.

"That's an understatement," Steve muttered.

Tugging Steph a little tighter into me, I used the hand at her waist to flip them both off as we walked toward the shooting range. Tony had set up a table with several different types of holsters. Basically she had at least one option in each carry position, shoulder, small of back, hip, thigh, and ankle. For those with multiple options, we had her alternate between them until she had a favorite, then we had her practice with each until she was comfortable with each of the draws with her dominant hand.

By unspoken agreement, I wasn't the only one working with her. In fact, once we moved on to off-hand draws and shooting, Steve had smoothly stepped in to take over, rightly guessing that Steph would get very frustrated during the process.

"I don't understand why I have to have so many holsters, and why I have to be able to do this left handed!"

"It is my greatest hope that all you ever have to do is practice," said Sif slowly. "However, if you are in battle and your right arm fails you, would you not like the reassurance of knowing you could use your left?"

Natasha slowly slid her way over to sit next to me on the table I was leaning against while watching Stephanie work.

"She's much better already; you were right about providing her an extremely powerful but non-lethal weapon, Barton. It seems to make the world of difference to her confidence in the situation." I just hummed in response, but Natasha, of course, was undeterred and went right on with the conversation she intended to have whether or not I was interested in participating. "So, finally say those three words?"

"Like you're one to talk!"

"Hey, I have a damaged past."

"Uh, hello?!" I responded waving a hand over myself.

"Fair enough. What was her excuse?"

"She's got her own past, and it may not be as traumatic as mine, but I don't think that it involved _unconditional_ love at any point in time. Except for maybe from her grandmother, but that's not enough." This time it was Natasha who hummed, and I decided to throw whatever her game was off a little if I could. "I want to take her out. I realized earlier that I've never really taken her on a date. We went to Vegas, of course, and we have date nights in our apartment where we get some alone time, but we haven't gone out together yet. And it's been over a month, so that's probably not okay."

"It's understandable, you know. We're not really people who go out and have a good time. It's hard to let your guard down and just enjoy."

"I know, but over the past couple of weeks, she's proven she can take care of herself pretty well if something happens. And I don't know, it's summer. I want to take her out to a park or something, and just let us both be normal for a day."

"Parks are nice, and there's a nice big one just a little ways away," Natasha said thoughtfully. "I know you're thinking date day and all, but if you're willing to share, I think we could all use some fun."

"I suppose I can share."

After a short bit more time in the range, Steph and I were heading upstairs, cleaning up after all the workouts, and settling down in the common room to watch TV cuddled up on a couch together and conversing with various people who floated in and out. Once he'd woken up and been checked over by Bruce, Ranger had joined us. Neither he nor Steph spoke of her shooting him, but both seemed oddly okay with it. When Steph dozed off, I took advantage of the time to do some research and invite the rest of the team out with us tomorrow, offering them a rough itinerary and a list of required gear. JARVIS and I collaborated to get Steph anything she didn't already have, and make sure everything showed up when and where we needed it.

Bucky had returned by dinnertime, and didn't have a lot of concrete information to share for the time being. It seemed as though the two men may have been operating without the local gang's direct knowledge or consent and some meetings were set up for the coming days when everything would be hashed out. Bucky wasn't going to be able to get into those, but he'd made a few contacts that he thought would pull through for him with information over the weekend or at the beginning of the next week.

The sun was just beginning to think about coming up the next morning as I started kissing up Steph's arm and shoulder before burrowing into her neck. Feeling her breathing change, I leaned back to watch her face as she peeked one eye open then squeezed it shut.

"No."

Chuckling, I slid my hands down to her sides as I said, "you don't even know what I want."

"It's the middle of the night! I don't care what you want, I'm sleeping."

"It's morning, Steph."

"No it isn't. The sun is all the way up when it is morning, especially in the summer."

"Well, I mean, technically it isn't summer yet, but close enough. Come on Steph, I know it's early, but I have a full day planned."

"So go, have your day and leave me here to sleep for like four more hours before I have to start working."

"You have the day off, and my plans involve you, so time to get up. Don't make me play dirty."

In response, Steph just pulled the pillow over out from under her head, and put it over her, pressing down, presumably to muffle the sound of my speech.

"Don't say I didn't warn you," I muttered before allowing my fingers to dig in and start tickling.

Steph's reaction was instantaneous, flinging the pillow off her head as she shrieked and tried to squirm away. I was laughing, but not letting up, as Steph cried out for me to stop between alternating screeches and giggles. When our bedroom door splintered, breaking inwards, I immediately shielded Steph with my body and pulled my gun off the bedside table. It was in my hand, safety off, and aimed before I fully processed what was in front of me. Steph squeaked and pulled the sheet up to cover herself while Steve quickly turned his eyes away, and Bucky and Natasha holstered their weapons looking amused.

"Jesus Christ guys, what are you doing?! Look at what you did to the door!"

"Steph was screaming," Steve said, eyes firmly planted on the ceiling. "We were worried, and since you were supposed to be out here already…" he trailed off, but I was pretty sure the rest of the sentence was that they were worried.

Huffing out a breath, I rolled out of bed, walking over to the oversized dresser and digging out some boxers and pulling them on. Once I was done, I tossed a pair of panties and a shirt to Steph more than a little amused when she crawled all the way under the covers to get dressed. Everyone had already seen a whole heck of a lot of her the day her car exploded, but knowing she wasn't happy to be up so early, I kept the thought to myself. When she climbed out of bed, she glared at me then at everyone else, but I just pressed a kiss to her cheek and told her there were clothes waiting for her in the bathroom that would work to start our day, but if she didn't like them, she could pick something else.

All I got in return was a growl, and I chuckled to myself as she stumbled into the bathroom. Raising a brow, at the others, I started picking out my own clothes.

"Can I help you?"

Natasha had settled into one of the armchairs next to the bookcase, and smiled serenely. "Since we're already here, I just figure I might as well stay and make sure there aren't any more delays this morning. It isn't nice to keep people waiting."

"It isn't nice to break down people's bedroom door either."

"Steph was screaming, and Steve was concerned," Natasha said dully.

"Yeah, and you knew full well what you were likely going to bust in on."

"I have to say, I'm disappointed. I was expecting more of a show; you must be losing your touch."

Steve was picking up the pieces of what used to be our door and let out a surprised laugh at that. I just shrugged and said, "we were behind schedule, and I didn't think we had time before we were interrupted. Clearly I was right."

"Don't distribute a schedule if you don't plan to follow it."

"It said times were approximate! Especially for breakfast."

"There had better be some goddamn coffee," Steph muttered as she made her way out of the bathroom and over to the closet. "I'm not going to walk around all day in yoga pants, Clint."

Natasha clicked her tongue and then got up and helped Steph pick out clothes for the day shooting me a look that told me not to say a word. That was when I noticed everyone else was in jeans rather than workout clothes, so I sighed and changed. Natasha snagged my workout clothes and the clothes I'd picked out for Steph and handed them to Bucky who disappeared. Presumably he was putting those with the gear for the afternoon.

When Steph came back out of the closet, I was pleased to see that she'd chosen to wear purple again. She'd previously confessed to not wearing it a ton, but picking up more of it when she could because she knew I enjoyed it. At first, I'd thought the sundress was polka-dotted, but closer inspection showed that they were tiny arrows rather than dots, and I felt a huge grin split my face.

"Men are so predictable," Natasha said.

"Oh, is that right?" I asked, reaching over and pulling her bra strap out to show that it was covered in Captain America shields.

Steph laugh a little as Natasha shrugged and said, "like I said, men are predictable. Doesn't mean I don't take advantage of it every chance I get!"

Natasha had an arm looped through Steph's as she walked her out of the room. I called out to her, "hey, date day! You promised I could have dibs on Steph if I let you all tag along!"

"You can, once we've made it out of the building and away from all beds and other such surfaces," she retorted.

Steve came up behind me and clapped me on the shoulder in a sympathetic way before walking out of the room leaving me no choice but to follow. I watched as Bucky presented Steph with a large thermos of coffee and let her sneak a boston creme out of the giant box of doughnuts I'd arranged to have delivered. When she smiled and gave him a kiss on the cheek, I didn't pout because that wasn't something I ever did. Bucky gave me a wink over Steph's shoulder and I growled, pulling her back to me as we walked to the elevator. This time it was Steph who laughed and leaned up to give my neck a quick kiss with just a hint of a nibble in it.

We took the elevator down to the Tower lobby where the rest of the team was waiting before stepping out into the cool morning air. When I looked over at Steph concerned that she might be cold, she just tucked herself under my arm and said, "I'm enjoying the cold while it lasts because I'm sure I'll be plenty warm later." She took a couple sips of her coffee then, in what I knew to be a sign of love, held it up to me to have some if I wanted. I just shook my head with a smile and rubbed my hand up and down her arm. "I do have my ICER, by the way. Just want you to know I meant it when I said I'd take it when we went out."

"I know."

"How do you know?"

"Two ways. First, Natasha was there when you got dressed and I'd be surprised if she let you go out with anything less than a gun. Second, you're walking just a little differently. Thigh holster under the dress, right?"

Steph poked my ribs and said, "that wasn't all that impressive. I already told you I was armed, and that's really the only place I could hide a gun right now."

She had a point, but I didn't want to disappoint so I added, "two knives on the other thigh, those mini-throwable taser things Natasha loves so much in the bra, and I'm assuming those shoes have things stashed in them because no way Natasha doesn't take full advantage of that much empty, sole and I know she bought those for you last week." Steph pursed her lips and didn't say anything, so I winked down at her and said, "see, I _am_ impressive."


	13. Date Day and Group Bonding

**Chapter 13 - Date and Group Bonding**

_**Steph's POV**_

The doughnut Bucky had let me sneak from the giant box hadn't even made it out of the elevator, nor had half of my giant thermos of coffee. But I was savoring the last half of the coffee snuggled up into Clint as we walked through the streets of Manhattan. Probably because this was supposed to be more date than anything else, the others were, for the most part, giving Clint and I space as we meandered through the city. I kept trying to guess what we were doing, and as I did so, Clint would frown from time to time.

Finally I looked up at him and asked, "what?"

"Do you know this city's layout at all?"

"Not really, no. I hardly ever came in from Trenton before moving here, and I've really only gone out with Pepper. Usually Happy drives us."

"Hmmmm," was all I got in response.

With a sigh I said, "you're going to have me study maps now, aren't you?"

Turning, Clint pressed a kiss into my cheek before saying way too happily, "yep!"

I grumbled to myself and burrowed in while drinking more of my coffee. As soon as I finished, Clint whisked the empty thermos out of my hands and presumably stashed it away in the backpack he was carrying.

It had been maybe twenty minutes since we'd left the Tower when we reached an entrance to Central Park. So that was how my geographically challenged nature had been so obvious to Clint. It was a pretty big ticket attraction, and if I'd realized we were walking toward it, I probably would have guessed it very early on in the list. We took a few minutes to sit scattered on benches around the pond when we first got into the park to quickly eat our breakfast.

After we finished and disposed of our trash, we walked over to the edge of a fenced off area where a very nervous, but eager looking man was waiting. As we approached, I watched the man spot us and start fidgeting even more.

"Somebody knows who he's about to meet," I whispered to Clint.

"Yeah, the famous Mrs. Barton," he responded with a smile.

"Huh, I don't think anyone has called me that yet. Other than JARVIS, of course."

"Oh, yeah? How'd it feel?"

"Not going to lie, it felt a little weird," I responded with a smile.

"That's okay, it felt a little weird to say," Clint whispered back. Then he added, "good weird though."

"Yeah. Good weird."

It turned out we were getting a private tour of the nature sanctuary, and once our guide, Ted, calmed down about who everyone was, he proved to be quite knowledgeable. When Clint pulled a pair of binoculars for each of us out of his backpack so we could look at the birds, I just laughed and told him it wasn't going to help with our bird nickname problem.

"That's okay, Gorgeous. They're just jealous because birds are fucking awesome," was Clint response, and I couldn't help but laugh and admire his confidence in that.

Once we had finished up what I was sure was a much longer and more thorough tour than most groups received, we wandered over to an area where some Stark Industries security were standing around over a brunch picnic set-up. As I'd been learning, part of the way you kept super soldier friends happy was by feeding them constantly. Not that I minded in the least, I thought as I snagged a few cookies to snack on.

Sam was watching me with an amused look on his face as he said, "how has your metabolism not betrayed you yet?"

I shrugged, "I don't know, but that day will come eventually. So I might as well enjoy myself until then, right?"

Clint rolled his eyes at that, and I just poked him in his beautifully muscular abs. Truth be told, although I'd figured the constant presence of delicious food in the Tower would have me gaining weight, the constant training I was allowing the team to thrust upon me was actually having the opposite effect. I weighed about the same, but in just a month, that weight was already beginning to look leaner and fitter than it had previously on me.

Once we finished eating, Clint handed me the clothes from earlier in the morning and pointed me toward the bathrooms. A laughing Natasha followed and we quickly stepped into stalls and changed. Fixing my ponytail at the sink as Natasha strode out in what looked more like her combat suit than anything else, I pointed to the weapons I'd been wearing.

"What do I do with these?"

"Strap them back on, Steph."

As I was arming myself again, a couple of women walked in, looked at my mini-arsenal, and shrugged before continuing into stalls to do their business.

"I love New York," Natasha said in response.

I was still giggling as we joined the others, and when Bucky looked like he was going to ask what was so funny, I just told him you had to be there, as I took in the giant exercise crash pad thing that he and Steve were now lugging between them. Deciding to just see what was happening, I quietly followed along until we were standing in front of a boulder. Steve and Bucky set the mats down the base of it and then everyone stepped back and slowly studied the giant rock before them.

Except for Clint. Clint was messing around in another bag that had appeared as if from nowhere. He came up with what looked like some absolutely ridiculous shoes, tape, and a few little bags with a white powder on the outside that I assumed was _not_ drugs. He handed the pair of shoes to me, and I frowned but sat down to follow the wordless instructions and switched them out for the ones I had on. Hey, a three pair of shoe day was a-okay with me!

Once I'd put the shoes on, he squatted in front of me and started taping above and below my knuckles. When he got to my ring finger on my left hand, he pressed a kiss to my wedding band then slipped it off and zipped it into a compartment on his pants for safe keeping. Finally deciding to cut the silence routine, I opened my mouth to ask what the plan was here when Bucky just started fucking climbing the side of the rock. Much less than a minute later, he was at the top looking down at us.

Eyes wide and mouth hanging open, I turned back to Clint. Then I just started laughing uncontrollably before gasping out, "you can't seriously think I can do that!"

"Of course you can. This one is easy! But, unlike Mr. Show-off over there, you aren't going to start cold, so let's start with just a little bit of a warm up."

Fifteen minutes later I found myself in the same place I had been before, staring at a boulder that I was apparently expected to climb. Everyone threw out different recommendations and then they just turned and looked at me expectantly.

"Don't I need like a harness or something?"

Clint just kicked the pads on the ground, "nope, you've got these."

"What if I miss those?"

"That's why you've got me spotting you."

"You're going to catch me?"

"Nope, just make sure you land on the pads."

Apparently, this was the easy route that they were showing me. So while the others did make attempts when I was too nervous to start, and Sam took the opportunity to demo how to fall, it really wasn't difficult for them. Instead they focused on cheering for me. I crouched down at the indicated spot to start and I said, "well, this just seems stupid. I'm now lower than I was standing."

"Every established problem has a start position, and that's this one's," Clint said.

I huffed out a breath and rolled my eyes, but chose to focus on the problem in front of me. About five minutes in I was two thirds of the way up, and I fell. There was only a moment, in which I still managed to feel a great deal of panic, before I, of course, landed on the mats. Clint leaned over and looked at me with a smile on his face before bending down and giving me a kiss.

"Falling less scary now?" he asked.

I thought about it for a couple of seconds before realizing he was right. "Yeah, but not any less embarrassing than I thought it would be."

"Nothing to be embarrassed about," Clint argued. "That was actually a pretty good showing for your first time."

"I think everyone else's average time was _maybe_ thirty seconds."

"Yeah, but they've all done this kind of thing before, so they have plenty of experience. This was your first time. And I'd be willing to bet that you'll get it on your next go."

"No bet," said Natasha with everyone echoing the sentiment.

With that vote of confidence, I got myself situated at the start point again, and started the climb. When I got to the point where I had gotten stuck the first time and fallen, I paused to catch my breath and get through the mental block of remembering falling. Bucky, who had stayed at the top, was looking down at me smiling and suddenly it dawned on me.

"This isn't for fun. This is a training exercise in disguise as a date, isn't it?" I called down.

"Can't it be both? Clint asked.

I snorted and looked back up at Bucky between glances around me. "How many times have you done this to get out of a bad situation?" I asked.

He grinned down at me with a look that I knew could probably help him get away with murder as he said, "too many to count, Doll."

I lunged for a handhold, and managed to grab onto it this time instead of falling. For the next couple minutes I was completely focused at the task in front of me until I finally made it to the top. Once I successfully pulled myself over, I rolled into a seated position and Bucky smiled at me. With a nod to his metal arm, I just said, "that's totally cheating. You can probably make your own handholds with that thing given the proper motivation."

When all I got was a shrug of acknowledgement, I laughed. I watched from below as Clint quickly scrambled up and perched next to me. Shaking my head, I asked, "now what?"

With hardly a glance below him, Clint just stepped back and jumped down to the mat. Even once he was holding his arms out to spot me, I was standing there chewing my lip.

"Ten seconds or I push you," Bucky said. I turned and stuck my tongue out at him and he said, "best keep that in when you jump so you don't bite it off."

I blanched but sighed and jumped down, tongue safely inside my mouth. Steve handed me a bottle of water, which I happily drank some of before following along as we moved to the next puzzle. Which was apparently at the same boulder. That's right. One rock, multiple paths, so I got to solve it a couple more times before we moved on

The second boulder was the same basic story, but the later routes felt a little more difficult to me. Whenever I'd get stuck, I'd get encouragement, and usually either Tony or Natasha demoing the path I was supposed to take since they were closer in size and strength to me- though both obviously stronger and more experienced. When I finally declared myself too exhausted to try anymore, Clint gave me my ring back and pulled out a beach towel for me to recline on and watch as the rest of the team moved on to routes that were MUCH more challenging. In fact, in my opinion, they looked impossible, but the team repeatedly proved me wrong. Once they'd each completed it once, they started racing, quickly drawing a crowd.

Much to my surprise, when we wrapped up with the climbing, we were met by two SUVs on the side of the park and quickly climbed inside. They just took us a short ways down the street to Mt. Sinai hospital, and in a side entrance. The team started pulling garment bags out of the back of the one we hadn't deposited all our stuff in earlier when we were picked up. Sif and I were handed normal outfits. Glancing at Clint's bag, however, I saw his Hawkeye uniform and a small smile broke out on my face.

Clint pulled me to the side and said, "I hope you don't mind, but when we're all in the neighborhood, we like to set something up and stop by if we can."

"I think it's great," I replied.

"It's tough, and if it gets to be too much, you and Sif can come back here and head back to the Tower."

"I think it's great," I repeated myself. Just like that we were ushered into a pair of employee locker rooms. Natasha, Sif, and I quickly showered and changed into our provided clothes. Sif and I each had simple black skirts and shirts, mine in a deep purple that matched the hints of color on Clint's uniform and Sif's in the dark red of the dress she wore under her armor.

As we walked along the children's hospital floors, I whispered to Sif, "does it feel strange to you to not be armed when the others are."

"Who says I am not armed? Surely you are armed, are you not?"

"I guess I meant armored?"

"Nay, for I do not always wear armor whilst home on Asgard, even if it _is_ my usual garb. And Thor warned me that it was not traditional to walk around this metropolis in such attire as an everyday occurrence. Which does explain the odd looks we received when we visited the Midgardian realm of New Mexico years ago."

Not really quite sure what to do with that information, I hummed in acknowledgment and we both went back to observing. Most of the children we saw were quite sick, but their time in the hospital seemed as though it may at least be somewhat alleviated by the presence of family. And it was easy to tell that this visit was a surprise, so it wasn't as though the families were visiting solely to see the Avengers- they genuinely cared and were present partners in their children's treatment.

For a few children though, I noticed this wasn't the case. The team seemed to notice as well and would spend just a few minutes more with each of those patients. After visiting them, Clint would circle back to walk with me to the next room, holding onto my hand. I would feel such sadness coming through the bond, and I was fairly certain he was reassuring himself that my presence meant he had a family now.

There was one little girl, Michelle, who we had been told was only seven years old and seemed particularly enamored with Natasha. When she caught a glimpse of Sif and me, she beckoned us forward. We glanced at each other a little unsure of ourselves because we'd managed to stay under the radar so far. Then as only a child can get away with so adorably, she started letting the truth bombs fly.

"The Avengers only have one girl on the team, and they need more. Are you trying out to be Avengers? Do you have powers?"

For the first time, I felt something in my mind that I thought might be one of my platonic soulmates. It felt as though I could almost hear Sif begging me to talk to the child, and that was when I realized that her talking for any length of time would give her away as being like Thor. And that would cause a lot of questions.

Realizing the conversation was going to fall on me, I squatted down to make myself eye level with Michelle. I opened my mouth and could already tell I was going to find this an impossible situation in which to lie. I caught Natasha's eye and said, "you know what, you're right. They do need more girl Avengers, but I'm sorry to say we aren't trying out. I don't have any powers, I'm just a regular girl like you. No super hero training whatsoever."

"Then why are you with them?"

"Well, sweetie, they're my friends. We were all together when they came here to see you, so I decided to hang around and see how many cool kids like you I could meet."

The girl seemed to think on it for a minute, and I was hoping I was out of the woods. As I stood up to leave, however, she asked me, "which one's your favorite?"

My eyes darted around and I could see amused looks on everyone's faces. They totally weren't going to help me out on this one. "Umm, what now?" I asked, hoping the girl would let me off the hook.

"Who is your favorite Avenger?"

"Oh, I don't know," I tried to hedge, "they're all pretty great. Who is your favorite?"

"Black Widow, of course, because she's a girl!"

"Of course!" I cried out in agreement. I was hoping she'd take that to mean Natasha was my favorite without me actually having to answer, and it might have worked if I hadn't accidentally locked eyes with Clint in that moment.

"Hawkeye's your favorite!" the girl cried out with glee. "You have a crush on Hawkeye!"

I looked at her carefully and said, "why would you think that?"

The grin on her face reminded me of the cheshire cat as she started counting out points on her fingers. "You're wearing black and purple, just like Hawkeye; he keeps moving closer to you; and you looked at him just then like you were in love." I ran a hand through my hair, trying to think of what to say, and her eyes went really big. "But you're married. You're not allowed to have a crush on anyone other than who you're married to!"

I had squatted back down at eye level with her and could practically feel the weight of my ring on my finger. Admittedly, I was floundering under her accusatory gaze, and I opened my mouth then shut it uncertain of how to respond. Apparently deciding to bail me out, Clint squatted down next to me. "Hey hey hey, it's okay," he said reassuringly. "This is Stephanie and she's married to me! See?" He held up his own wedding band to show her, but she still seemed skeptical.

Arms crossed across her chest she said, "you're not married! If you're married, then why haven't you kissed since you've been here? Married people kiss all the time! It's gross."

"Yeah, Hawkeye, why haven't you kissed her since you got here? You know, if she's your wife and all," Tony teased. During the time we'd spent in the hospital so far, a couple of photographers and reporters had shown up. One set was doing a write-up for the hospital, and another had been contacted by Pepper for team PR purposes. Luckily none of them were in the line of sight for the death glare I shot Tony, but he just waggled his eyebrows in response.

"Because, Honey," I said turning back to the girl with a smile, "public displays of affection make some people uncomfortable, and we really didn't think this was the place for that."

She was just sitting there with her arms across her chest and pouting stubbornly, so I turned to Clint. Of course, he actually didn't seem to care about PDAs. When I asked him about it later, he just said the cat was out of the bag about our relationship anyway, so he saw no reason not to comply. He pulled me forward with a hand around the back of my neck and pulled me into a deep but very sweet kiss. I wasn't sure how long it had been when I felt Natasha reach over and smack us both upside the head.

I cleared my throat as I pulled back and Natasha had a smile on her face and said, "You'll have to excuse them. They only recently got married, and we actually don't _let_ them kiss in public because they get carried away. And you're right, it is gross." She said the last bit very pointedly and I just rolled my eyes but looked back at the seven year old skeptic.

She had a huge smile on her face, and I couldn't hold back a chuckle. "You'll make a really good detective one day," I said, reaching up to rumple her hair.

"So Hawkeye is your favorite?"

I leaned my head into Clint's shoulder as I said, "yes, Hawkeye's my favorite."

"That's no fair," Tony whined. "Just because he's your romantic soulmate and the rest of us are only your platonics, he gets to be your favorite?"

I turned to Tony with a look of utter disbelief. Everyone else had tensed up as well when Tony let that information slip, and he started sputtering. Thankfully a nurse took pity on us and stepped forward telling the little girl that it was time for her to rest so we were going to have to leave. We quickly said goodbye and made our way out of the room.

"Seriously, Tony?" Bucky hissed once we were in the hallway.

Tony did at least look contrite as he said, "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to do that, Steph."

Deciding that he did look suitably freaked out and that I should just take the high road, I gave him a weak smile and said, "probably everyone would have found out eventually anyway."

Everyone offered to leave after that, but it didn't seem fair to the rest of the children on the floor, so I insisted that they finish as planned. Unfortunately someone, and I felt confident it wasn't one of the reporters because they wouldn't want to jeopardize their relationship with the team or the hospital, got in contact with someone outside. Probably just a benign text like, "hey, the Avengers are here. Did you know Hawkeye is married? His wife is here and apparently she has _all_ of them for her platonic soulmates."

Once the first extra photographer made his way in, we realized this might become a _thing_, so the team sped up their visits for the remainder of their rounds. The team quickly changed back into civilian clothes with Clint this time dragging me into the men's locker room with him and just telling me to stare at a wall. He wasn't willing to have me outside of his line of sight, and it was decided that was better than Hawkeye coming out of the women's locker room. Natasha took it one step further by joining us all, and I guessed they probably had to change and stuff in the field sometimes, so maybe it wasn't really all that weird for them.

Thankfully a quick-thinking hospital administrator was able to work out a plan and system for getting us out of the hospital unseen, so when the SUVs pulled back out on the street, we weren't followed. After a brief discussion between the vehicles via JARVIS, it was decided that we would continue as scheduled. That meant Pepper meeting us at a little gastropub that Clint had picked out a few blocks away. It was a nice neighborhood bar feel, and those who did seem to recognize us, didn't really seem to care. I got a nice, juicy burger, one of their local beers, and I dug into the numerous, generously portioned fries and other snacks that were ordered for the table. We took our time, eating, laughing, joking around, and just relaxing before heading back to the Tower.

The day had been so enjoyable, that I was almost able to forget about the secrets that had come to light for the public- at least for the rest of the night.

* * *

**A/N:** Let's just rip the bandaid off right now. As things stand, this is your penultimate chapter, meaning Chapter 14 is the end. Unless AoU fills me with warm fuzzies, which I'm 90% sure won't happen and I decide to rewrite and add more, things will be done at the end of the next chapter. Don't worry, there are still many chapters of Herculean Aftermath to come, so if you haven't done so yet, check that one out. s/11195702/1/Herculean-Aftermath


	14. Denouement

**Chapter 14 - Denouement**

_**Steph's POV**_

Before what had been dubbed, with varying levels of enthusiasm based on who you asked, "Date Day," I had thought my life was crazy. After the events at the end of the day, however, my life had kicked it up another notch. While Clint claimed that he was the least popular Avenger (which I wasn't sure was true but figured even if it was, he still had _plenty_ of fans), the fact that I was outed as his wife and soulmate as well as everyone else's platonic had people foaming at the mouth- either in excitement or anger.

There were people who thought it was awesome and were clamoring to know more about me; there were people who were adamant that I had pulled the biggest con in the history of the world by managing to trick them all into thinking they were my soulmates; and there were those who didn't care one way or the other, they just wanted the threat to their delusional happy world eliminated. It was absolutely crazy. The crowds that were normally outside the Tower had swelled in size, and I decided it was best to hide inside until some of the fervor died down.

It wasn't until the next week that I went out, and it was only for Michelle. I'd gotten a call from the hospital that she was taking a turn for the worse and asked if she could see the Avengers again. The team was on a mission, but I just didn't want her to think they'd forgotten about her or didn't care. So of course, I decided to go in on my own. I thought perhaps if I stayed low-profile, that would be the safest for everyone involved. The last thing I wanted was for the Slayers to see me going into the hospital and decide to shoot the place up or use the children as collateral to get me to cooperate.

In hindsight, it was stupid reasoning. The Slayers didn't need collateral to grab me. As I pulled into the hospital parking lot, they had parking attendants waving cars along the appropriate route to find the right spot. That seemed a little excessive for a hospital, but I supposed they were the professionals and knew what they were doing, so that was up to them. Parking in the indicated spot with a smile of thanks for the attendant, I grabbed the Avengers toys I'd picked up on my way and got out of the car. I hadn't even managed to lock the door before I felt a prick on the back of my neck and then I was out.

The first time, I came to, there was beating. It didn't really seem to have a point, and they certainly weren't asking me any questions. They were just hitting me. As far as I could tell, they weren't Slayers but I did feel a nagging sensation that the Slayers were there, just waiting their turn. And the men who were working me over never spoke, just hit me over and over, causing pain, but no permanent damage that I could tell. Then I felt a pinch and looked down to see another dart in my leg. Seriously, how many times could they drug a girl?

When I woke up the second time, the lights were out, and I felt myself panic. Was I blind? What had happened to Michelle? Was she actually more sick or was she just a pawn that they hadn't had to touch to play? How was Clint? Did they know yet that I was missing? I knew he'd take it badly because he hadn't been there himself to protect me. And most importantly, did they know where I was? Tony had been waiting to implant the tracker until he had the next version ready to go, and I guess it was too late now. So many regrets.

Realizing that I could quickly lose myself in all those questions, doubts, and fears especially in the dark, which I realized with a sudden clarity was a type of psychological warfare. My captors weren't even going to pretend to have a good cop. It was bad cop all the way. But I had a trick up my sleeve. Something they didn't know I had that would keep me sane. Clint.

Reaching out to that corner of my brain, I mentally searched for Clint and felt a relieved response. We hadn't really gotten beyond being able to transfer emotions to each other, but I knew it was theoretically possible. And the way everyone else was reacting to our bond, I felt confident we were capable. Figuring that basic concepts would be better than words to start, I allowed the complete darkness to enter my mind and focused on sending that to him. In return I felt his understanding, and then he sent me some warmth and light back through the bond. Something for me to hold onto.

For what I was sure was hours on end, that was all I had. All I could do, but it was something. I'd managed to get myself moving, which was a relief, though I was definitely restrained. I focused on the cool touch of the metal against my wrists and ankles and felt that understanding again as well as a cool reassurance.

"Hurt?" the question came across the bond in a single word form.

I did a mental self evaluation and sent back, "no." Which was true because although I was bruised, there was nothing that was so bad it would keep me from running given the right opportunity.

After that, I settled in to wait, reaching out to Clint for reassurance periodically but not wanting to occupy too much of his time that he could otherwise be using to try to find me. I expected the others to try to get through to me as well, but given our previous interactions, I wasn't too surprised when hours later it was Sif I felt in my brain. Perhaps it was her thousands of years of knowledge and time to bond with her other "soul siblings" that made her the one who could push through and get a full sentence to me.

"When you have a chance, all you need to do is get outside- I will get to you."

I could feel the others trying to push in, but couldn't identify any of them specifically.

Hearing sounds for the first time, I felt myself panic.

"Observe," Clint pushed to me. "Learn."

When the door opened, I could see, so that was a relief. As they started unshackling me, I realized that they were not taking me seriously as a threat at all. They'd stripped me of my gun and my stun gun, but I was otherwise untouched. They'd also only brought a two man guard, and they didn't shackle my hands together. The way I saw it, when I resisted whatever they had in store for me at my destination, they'd realize the extent of the training I'd been given. It seemed like they were very confident in being able to contain me, but I couldn't count on them staying that confident. I had to take advantage of their misstep now.

I reached out in my mind to Sif, telling her to get ready and took a leap of faith that she meant what she said. As the men shoved me out of the room they'd been confining in, I staggered at the brightness of the hallway. I made a show of it and appearing discombobulated as they shoved me around. This granted me the opportunity to see security cameras, but no immediate backup. A quick glimpse of the windows showed that I was above ground, something I had feared might not be true. How high, I wasn't sure, but the window closest to me had a generous ledge.

Through our bond, I sent Clint all the love I felt for him, and I felt concern followed by a bolstering of support. It seemed Natasha finally figured out how to break through because I heard her voice clear as day in my head, resolutely saying, "fight."

This time, I allowed my feigned trip, that was aided by my captors, to pull those beautiful stunners I had tucked into my clothes out. Then I was moving, faster than I'd realized I knew how. Each man got hit, and I quickly took their guns, flipped the safety on one, and tucked it into the back of my pants. Knowing someone would have seen me on camera anyway, I didn't give a second thought to making noise, just took the second gun and used it to shoot out the window as I ran to it. Not taking any more time to stop and think, I continued to move, climbing out onto the ledge.

I could hear yelling and the sound of footsteps, so I looked wildly around. I was really hoping Sif didn't need much time as I found a foothold and a handhold, and stepped out onto the side of the building. Thank goodness it was made of stones rather than being completely smooth. Slowly, I inched my way out. I had a gut feeling that my captors didn't want me dead yet. And that was giving me a fighting chance. In the next window over from me, I saw a flash of something very bright behind me.

Then I heard it, "Sister of the soul! Jump!" So I did, pushing lightly off the wall to make sure I didn't hit it on my way down. Sif caught me easily then said, "hold on tight" and the bright light was back, a mixture of all the colors of the rainbow and we were spinning and flying through the air. When it stopped, I stumbled a little, but immediately felt myself wrapped in the arms of Clint.

"Hey, Gorgeous," he whispered in my ear. "You're back. You're safe. Pepper's going to stay with you while we go make sure that those people aren't a problem for you again. I love you."

After a quick kiss from Clint, he gently guided me back to Pepper and walked over to the rest of the team. In a flash of rainbow light, they were gone again.

"Oh my god, Steph. Are you okay?" Pepper asked. With a hand on my elbow, she carefully guided me back inside the building from the landing pad. As soon as she settled me onto a couch in the small lobby that was inside, a doctor strode forward. Pepper made some introductions that I couldn't remember because I was too busy just trying to process the fact that I was home.

Apparently when you aren't paying close enough attention to doctors' questions after a traumatic incident and you let slip that you were unconscious for long stretches of time and drugged at least twice with unknown substances, well, the doctors get a little bit concerned. As does Pepper for that matter. Without further delay, I was taken down to the medical floor and then the fun began. They weren't eager to let me sleep, so I was never left alone with the opportunity to do so. Although that wasn't so bad because it was usually Pepper who stayed with me, and she seemed okay to pretend that the kidnapping had never happened. Or at least to let me pretend.

The doctors started by running blood tests, then I had to wait around while it was analyzed and we waited for results. When they came back, they took me for MRIs, CAT scans, and x-rays. Each of those seemed to take forever as well, and I was losing patience because I knew there was a lot of swelling and tenderness, but I was certain nothing was broken.

This time while we were waiting for results, they allowed me to use the restroom unsupervised. Finally feeling brave enough as I was washing my hands to catch a glimpse of my reflection in the mirror, I let out a small yelp. The door burst open and I blinked in surprise at Clint, arrow drawn scanning the room for a threat. When he realized I was alone, he lowered the weapon and quickly and efficiently stowed it and the arrow on his back once more.

"What's wrong, Steph?"

I had a hand over my heart and said, "seriously, Clint, warn a girl! I was just kidnapped for goodness sake! You scared the crap out of me!"

With a sigh, Clint pulled me into him and gently picked me up to carry me out of the room as he responded, "yeah, welcome to the last four days of my life, Steph. Trust me, I am very aware of the fact that you were kidnapped." Instead of stopping in the medical suite I'd been using, he carried me straight into the elevator. Without instruction from either of us, JARVIS started it moving and a moment later we were stepping out onto the team's common floor. Seeing Clint carrying me instead of me walking, everyone- still in full battle gear- started freaking out at once.

"Hey!" I shouted, "I'm okay! Clint's just carrying me because it makes him feel better, I think."

"You were screaming," he replied petulantly.

"One tiny scream when I saw my reflection in the mirror because holy hell, have you _seen_ my face?"

That was not the way to go because everyone looked at my face more carefully, took in all the injuries, and I could practically watch them start to see red one by one. Except Bruce, he looked like he was seeing green as he started taking careful, measured breaths.

"I'm fine," I tried again.

"What were you thinking?" Bucky finally broke and asked.

"I was thinking that there was a small sick child who was scared. I'm not any of you, but if I could do my damnedest to give her some measure of comfort."

The look in Bucky's face when he looked over at Steve at my words made me think he still remembered all too well what it had been like when Steve was a small, sick child. Meeting my gaze, he gave me a nod of understanding before he said, "for what it's worth, the girl's actually doing much better. She had been discharged the day after we all visited, and she's safe. Apparently someone was able to find a relative who was unaware of the situation but willing to help out. She's okay now."

"Good," I whispered looking at Tony with a piercing enough gaze to make sure I knew that was him even if he'd never admit it. Settling into Clint's side a little more snuggly, I asked, "who was it?"

I felt Clint take a deep breath as he said, "it was my fault."

"Unless that was the world's most fucked up training, I'm pretty sure that's not true," I said, twisting my neck so I could brush a kiss on Clint's cheek.

"There was a guy who used to be a SHIELD specialist; his name was Grant Ward."

"He was good," Natasha added, "but not nearly as good as us, so when he was putting together the Avengers Initiative, Fury passed on Ward's application and brought us in instead."

"Ward, it seems, didn't take this well," Clint said.

Steve snorted out a laugh and when I looked at him questioningly he said, "Ward had a crazy mentor who he allowed to talk him into being a HYDRA infiltrator many years ago. Apparently Ward was promising that he'd get chosen for the Avengers and be able to take us down from the inside. His failure to do so was punished, and he obsessed about Clint because he figured that Clint's spot was the one he should have had."

"Well, that's just dumb," I muttered. "It isn't like there was some kind of rule there could only be a set number of you. If he was that good, he would have been on the team also, not instead. Just look at Sam and Bucky."

Sam preened at the comment while Bucky just remained stone faced, but I could see a little bit of a smile in his eyes. Clint picked up the story again, saying, "he's been watching and waiting for an opportunity. When he found out about you, he decided to focus there. He brought in Eugene and Anton in an attempt to frighten you and distract all of us so he could make a move."

"That doesn't make sense. Shouldn't he have played the terror game longer? That seems like it was rushed."

"You complaining about not being tormented for long enough?" Sam asked.

"No, just trying to understand. If he was that good, I would have thought he'd be patient enough to wait for the big payoff."

"We asked, Lastochka." Natasha said steadily, "he declined to let us know, and now he is incapable of doing so."

"Oh," I said softly. "and Eugene and Anton?"

"Also won't be a problem ever again," Natasha clarified.

"They were delivered to the remaining Slayers here and in Trenton, so we don't believe that they will be a problem again either," Bucky said coldly.

I didn't really know what to say, just went kind of numb. Finally I asked, "who?"

"Does it really matter, Steph?" Sam asked.

"Any one of us would have done it," Steve added.

"I guess not. I'm just," I paused, trying to figure out exactly what to say before settling on, "sorry."

Much to my surprise, Bruce snorted out a laugh at that. "Don't be," he said sounding more feral than I'd ever heard.

"Now, if nothing ails you," Thor said, pausing for me to nod my head in agreement that I wasn't suffering any more damage then they could see. "Let us feast while you regale us of the tale of your victory. Lady Sif tells us you had the situation well at hand when she arrived. She simply expedited your journey home."

This crazy family of mine was clearly willing to help me with any problems that might come up without making me feel guilty or as though I was a burden to them. It was a refreshing feeling. As Clint helped me up and we all walked toward the kitchen to see what we could eat without much effort, I smiled and said, "well, you remember what you taught me on date day?..."

_**The End.**_


End file.
